#and hes ever watching for a chance to gnaw his way out of that cage

[alagaesia-headcanons]

the wolves' dinner

This is the drabble I mentioned in this post. ( @marimo331 @dayzcakes ask and ye shall receive~)

Summary: Selena spirits Murtagh away to Carvahall so that she and Brom can raise him and Eragon together in peace, hidden from the world. But Murtagh never forgets the truth of his father, possessed of memories that his parents adamantly steer him away from out of their own fear of the past. Yet it does nothing to avert the reconvergence fated for them all...

Word Count: 1,157

Warnings: None

Read below or on Ao3

-

The field work is done and everyone else has returned to the house by the time Murtagh finishes up his final tasks in the barn. That’s partially by design, as he likes the quiet that arises when he lingers long enough. Selena sometimes chides that he comes in late for dinner, but she always saves him a portion anyway. Brom declares that if he stays out any longer, he’ll provide the wolves their own dinner, but with the good humor of man who’s ensured no such thing could befall him. His parents indulge and love him even as they raise their obligatory fuss. But Murtagh seeks the quiet to think about the things that have no place anywhere else.

Birka nickers at him and he pours a last bit of feed into her trough with a sigh. Judging by the shadows cast by the shaft of light spilling through the doors, he ought to leave soon to avoid another quip about the wolves tonight. Murtagh pats Birka fondly, promising, “I’ll go riding with you as soon as I get the chance.” Then he pulls the barn doors closed and diligently locks them.

In the last dying streaks of sunlight, as he turns to face his family’s secluded sliver of Palancar Valley, Murtagh sees the silhouette of a lone figure on horseback coming up the road. Instead of going directly up the hill to the house, he slowly wraps around the other way towards the road to get a better look, urged by a low, prevailing thrum of curiosity. The person rides into the shadow of a mountain peak, unveiling their colors and features. Atop a gleaming roan horse sits a broad shouldered man wearing a dark, fur lined cloak that looks as heavy as the well worn exhaustion suffusing him. He has black hair streaked with gray and a severe, lined countenance of eerie familiarity.

As his steed trots nearer, Murtagh sees one deep black eye and another of icy blue, and he knows he is looking into the face of his father.

Looking too blatantly for too long, it seems, for the man reins in his horse and throws Murtagh a sharp, skeptical stare with those mismatched eyes. Murtagh makes a token effort to ease his own scrutiny as the man glances at the distant house, then back to him. He scowls, then abruptly swings himself down from the saddle and faces him directly.

“Tell me your name.”

Those words flow like cold water down his spine, rousing him as if from a dream. Because, up until this moment, he could swear he’s had this very dream a thousand times. He cannot tell him the truth, wouldn’t dare, but he must say something. Any lie fleeing him, forgetting every name but his own, Murtagh shakes his head and impulsively answers with a sideways honesty, “I’m no one.”

The man tilts his head and takes a step closer. “Is that so? Because that sounds to me like the answer of a man who’s name could get him in trouble. Tell me.”

Murtagh doesn’t waver despite the alarmingly accurate assessment, pervaded by an incongruous calm. He suggests no guilt or fear. “That’s not what I meant. It wouldn’t mean something so serious because it doesn’t mean much at all. It’d be a waste of my breath and your time because I’m no one, really.”

The distrust in his eyes doesn’t vanish, but it shifts like the thought was shrugged off in favor of something else. “I don’t believe you. You don’t strike me as quite so insignificant.”

“It’s true. Not for lack of effort, but every time I’ve tried to figure out who I am, to make something of myself, the attempt was always disapproved of and cut off.”

The man grunts in acknowledgement. “A very stifled life that will lend you,” he allows.

Murtagh looks down the road in the direction he came, down that valley to the rest of the world, down south, in the direction of the Empire’s heart. “Is your life the same? Or have you tasted more freedom and learned what the world has to offer and made that your own? Do you know what it feels like... to truly come into your own?”

“No,” he declares promptly. “I’m no different. I have nothing to offer you- you’d better look elsewhere.” Murtagh wonders if his mother once felt similarly stifled and if, back then, his father believed differently about his ability to give her something more. “In my life, everything gained comes at a cost far higher than it was ever worth, and there’s no escape from all the loss. So it’s defining. My whole existence is stifled.”

Murtagh knows without a doubt why; his life exists directly beneath the thumb of the king. But he can’t acknowledge that, and it feels stingingly awkward to know the truth behind his bitter remarks far more intimately than he realizes. Instead, he does not confront it at all, gesturing behind the man and replying, “At least it lends you such a fine horse. It must make travelling a great deal more pleasant, because I can’t imagine a better companion than that. I’ve never seen a horse so beautiful. I bet it can race quicker than the wind- I’m jealous.”

Eyes narrowing, his lip curls back and his chin twitches up into a derisive angle, but the motion follows through until he’s turned aside, gaze torn away. He glares fiercely at the horizon, his flash of anger rapidly losing heat until exhaustion has quenched it, which then yields enough room for contemplation. “Well, I suppose you’re right. He’s an exceptional beast. And I appreciate the companionship of any creature that can carry me away, away, away...”

“Away from...?” he feigns, desperate to know what he might say.

The man looks his way, his black and blue eyes suddenly assuming an imposing, indomitable clarity in that moment, taking in every last piece of him. Then he comes a step closer and grips Murtagh’s shoulder, thumb angled down to press into his bicep, stopping his heart mid beat at the sensation of his father’s touch. “For your sake, child, may you never find out,” he intones, like delivering a blessing.

Then he releases him and pulls away, turning back to his horse. After he lifts himself into the saddle, the distance and darkness make the two different colors of his eyes almost indistinguishable. The sunlight dies a fast death in the valley. “Will you tell me your name?” Murtagh asks before he stirs back into motion.

“No,” Morzan says. “No point. It won’t do you any good.”

“Alright. Farewell then, no one.”

That earns him a smile, one so unexpected, his breath falters for a second. “Ha. Same to you, my fellow no one. Good luck coming into your own.” He flicks the reins and his horse takes off at a trot, carrying him away, away from Murtagh.

[amourane]

smitten

pairing: yoon jeonghan x fem!reader

genre: fluff

w/c: 0.7k

summary: jeonghan is completely smitten for you and he refuses to admit it.

warnings: noneee

a/n: aaa i hope you guys like this <3 i wasn't gonna post two fics in a row but i whipped this one up in about half an hour so i hope you guys enjoy it! not sure if i should make it a mini series, lmk!

Jeonghan found it hard to breathe with you around. He found it hard to focus, to concentrate. He had always been one to keep his cool, to stay calm and collected but ever since he met you all logical thinking had been thrown out of the window. He wasn’t a type of guy that would get nervous and he certainly wasn’t the type of guy that would get distracted. Jeonghan prided himself in being the stoic and very attractive star student at Seoul National University. 

So why did he find himself completely befuddled in front of you?

You who were so beautiful, so pretty, so gorgeous yet so annoying. He had never met another girl who would claw at his bones more than you. Your tinkling laugh and bright shiny eyes. It all made him go positively crazy and he couldn’t do anything to help that. You had this magnetic pull that would drag Jeonghan along despite his protests. 

His friends had all teased him for it. They had seen the way his cheeks would flush whenever you stared at him or the way he would look at you with the most lovesick eyes. Nevertheless, he continued to deny his affections. 

It didn’t matter anyway. You were too dense to notice how everyone seemed to snicker whenever you went up to Jeonghan or the way everyone would peer over their textbooks whenever you asked to partner up with the infamous student. You, who’s smile was so bright, failed to see how everyone could tell how smitten Yoon Jeonghan was for you even if he denied it. 

“Hannie!” Your voice echoed through the hallway and Jeonghan winced at the loud sound. His expression remained neutral as you came bounding up towards him with the most adorable grin on your face. “Guess who just got full marks on her test? Me!”

The test paper you shoved in his face made Jeonghan go cross eyes as he struggled to decipher your scrawled answers and the red pen the professor had marked with. The biggest thing that caught his eyes was the 100 in the top right hand corner. 

“That’s good Y/n.”

“Is that all you have to say?” You pouted as you removed the test paper from his face. “I worked so hard for that Hannie, I pulled all nighters and everything! I didn’t even ask you for any help, isn’t that impressive?”

“Yeah.” Jeonghan felt the cage of butterflies fly open in his stomach and he gulped. “That’s amazing Y/n but you really shouldn’t stay up revising, it actually decreases the chance of taking information in. You can enter sleep deprivation and it has a really high chance of simply going blank in exams and that’s not good at all you know.”

Your smile remained on your face as Jeonghan continued to rattle off the side effects of lack of sleep. You stepped closer towards him, only inches away. Jeonghan’s breath hitched as he stared at your pretty face. His eyes flickered to your lips and then your eyes. The eyes he could stare into forever and not get bored with. 

“Then you help me revise. I could use help from that brain of yours. I actually did go blank in my exam but it wasn’t because of sleep deprivation.”

Jeonghan knew better than to ask what but he couldn’t help the curiosity that was gnawing at his mind like a beast begging to be set free. He stared at you, your bright expression rendering him speechless as he tried to come up with words to say.

“What was it then?” He croaked out, voice trembling at the close proximity. “Why did you get distracted?”

You giggled leaning in closer so that your lips were brushing his ear. “You.”

Jeonghan froze, his whole body stood still like ice and you continued to giggle and he saw the way your smile seemed to grow bigger. His heart pounded in his chest as he watched you step back, the test paper still clutched in your hands. He felt his cheeks burst into flames as his jaw hung open in shock at your words. 

“See you later Hannie! I’ll pop over so we can exchange notes.” 

You waved him goodbye before skipping away as if you hadn’t just caused the poor guy to melt in his shoes. Jeonghan gripped his textbooks tightly and he tried to breathe in through his nose and out through his mouth. The beating of his heart could be heard in his ears and he tried desperately to calm himself down.

You were the only one capable of making Yoon Jeonghan grow completely flustered and he hated it.

[morocosmos]

FFXIVWrite 2024 Day 25 - Perpetuity

Masterlist Fandom: Final Fantasy XIV Characters/Pairings: Leofard Myste/Warrior of Light Rating: Gen Additional Notes: Spoilers for Post-Endwalker MSQ, patch 6.55. Ao3 Link

“Leo?” 

At the sound of his name, Leofard rouses from the space between sleep and wakefulness, albeit reluctantly. He hates being cold, and no amount of blankets is enough to prevent the Sharlayan chill from seeping into his skin.

But he blinks once, then twice; Moro’a’s curled in on his side, facing him. Still awake. He meets the yet unspoken words in those blue eyes.

“I've been thinking. About what I said at the landing.” Moro’a’s voice ghosts the air, so quiet that Leofard can barely catch it. “I want you by my side, on my adventures — none of that's changed. But I also need you to know that it doesn't have to be forever.” 

Something in Leofard’s head registers that this is important; a weighty conversation spoken in soft words. Drowsy as he is, it rounds down to pillow talk. “Never crossed me mind,” he murmurs, fighting and quickly losing to a large yawn. Figuring that that's enough to settle the matter, he burrows deeper into the blankets and lets his eyes fall shut. “Sleep. Big day tomorrow, aye?”

“Mmm.” Leofard somehow catches the hint of doubt in that word, and he feels just enough annoyance — or is it concern? — to ruffle him into opening his eyes again.

He isn’t the sort to poke at these things. Especially not in bed. But he wants to sleep, and Moro’a won't leave a thought alone, not until he's gnawed it down to the marrow. He makes a discontented noise — for the lost sleep — then forces himself up by one elbow.

“If you want to say it, say it.” He watches as worry flits across Moro’a’s features, before softening into something else. Tenderness. His heart does an odd flip, the kind that happens whenever Moro’a looks at him this way.

Idiot, he thinks. But there’s affection in that too, small and warm and alive.

“It's just…this is a lot,” Moro’a begins. “For me, but especially for you, and—I don't want you thinking that there's a point where it becomes too late to turn back.” He looks at him, searching for something in the dark. “That you'll have to break your promise.”

Leofard knows that what he's being offered is a way out. That it has as much to do with his worries as it does Moro’a’s. It's strange — he's lived almost all of his life pursuing freedom. Clawing his way past the cold, the loss, the stifling cage, until he could lift his wings and truly fly. He'd spent a long time believing that love, this sort of love, would be a cage, too.

Until Moro’a had let him go, and he'd realised that what he was running from was rarer than luck, and more precious than any bauble. 

To think that he'd almost let himself lose such a prize.

“Don’t have to say it twice. I know,” he replies. He isn’t the kind to caress, but something compels him to reach out, and his hand fits along the corner of Moro’a’s jaw just so. “Remember what I said at that landing? That I wanted a taste of your life, the skies only you can reach? That hasn't changed, either.” And this is the most he can bring himself to say, because the squirming in his chest might kill him, otherwise: “I can't do any of that unless I stay close to you, can I?”

The way Moro’a smiles is worth the twist to his pride. But even he has his limits. “Alright, we've had our chat. Now let me get some beauty sleep,” he grumbles. Moro’a doesn’t argue, only reaches out to draw him closer, and he lets him. 

He doesn’t want to love the way Raimille had to, rooted in place as those close to his heart drift beyond his reach. With Moro’a, there’s a chance he might never have to.

He thinks of Tural, of jewelled waters and smooth sands, the cities and skies he can't yet fathom. Moro’a’s tucked under his chin, and the warm weight of him is more comforting than he’d ever dared to consider. It feels good, feels right.

He falls asleep this way, looking forward to all the new and familiar that’s to come.

[travelling-on-the-octopath]

s hello have any brainworms for roleswap dmvn formed in your mind yet....... bc im gnawing at the bars of my cage thinking about them

ALL RIGHT i've let this collect dust for long enough, I think.

Worldbuilding things!

Dimitri's parents are alive. Rufus is the equivalent of Miklan in this story, and I think he steals Areadbhar during month four of school. TBD.

The tragedy of Duscur doesn't happen, because Matthias' methods are the low-and-slow type rather than Lambert's "let's go have peace talks right now actually."

What DOES happen is the very beginnings of an armistice between Sreng and Faerghus, which is just as much a ploy by the slitherers now as it was in Duscur, and results in the incapacitation of Matthias as well as the death of the Queen and Miklan (and the usual cast and crew that got done in in Duscur, like Glenn).

Dimitri was there, but things play out a little differently. Still has absolutely bonkers levels of survivor's guilt. Why did Glenn have to lose his life instead of him? The queen and prince, too?

Felix's feelings on Dimitri are far more mixed because of it, I think. But that's another discussion (fic?).

Matthias shuts down on all attempts to make peace with other countries. He does put everything he has into trying to restabilize Faerghus, but his mind kinda snapped watching his son and wife die before his eyes. Sylvain straddles the line between hating him and feeling bad for him.

I'm sure I could have reworked this to make sense to include Duscur the way they have been, but brain running on fumes, so we'll take what we get. Feel free to imagine a character with a similar narrative role coming from Sreng instead. Maybe it's the son of the chieftain they . . . captured/took in/who the fuck knows.

Onto the dimivain of it all <3

Every hangup Sylvain has about people thirsting after his Crest and not him is cranked up to eleven, because now the chances of someone wanting the prestige of being his spouse (and by extension, a monarch) are ridiculously high.

Gautier territory is where it is, but the royal family lives in Fhirdiad. Because Blaiddyd territory is so close to where they actually are, the family charged with keeping them safe is pretty obvious. (Their monster of a Crest certainly doesn't hurt.)

Sylvain tries to poke Dimitri's buttons about this. "Doesn't it bother you? That you're stuck with me because of something you didn't choose?"

Dimitri doesn't have a real answer right away. He says something about being honoured, not caring to know another manner of life, same old same old. There's something in it about making your circumstances your own rather than fighting them tooth and nail that's at odds with Sylvain's perpetual "I know what I'm headed for but that doesn't mean I've gotta like it!"

Dimitri tries to tell Sylvain that bedding random women is not a great image for the crown prince. Sylvain loses his brain cells and asks if it'd be a safer rumour to have the crown prince be in love with his retainer.

Dimitri doesn't take him seriously for even a second.

Sylvain has never been more serious in his life.

"Dimitri, come on, you haven't ever said my name! I think you came out of the womb being all 'Your Highness' this, 'Your Highness' that." "I'm not sure what you mean, Your Highness." "You're so full of it! Just once? Please?" "I'm afraid not, Your Highness."

Sparring = flirting? Dimitri loses his composure whenever Sylvain really gets into it and tries to win, but it's a 50-50 chance on whether he actually succeeds.

Sylvain refuses to make the first move, when it's like that. Dimitri's heart's too big, and Sylvain doesn't want to know if he's being placated or pursued.

Unfortunately! Things get blown to bits during the timeskip. Dimitri damn near loses his life trying to prevent Sylvain from being captured by Cornelia's men, but he manages it. Unfortunately, he's still got a hell of a lot of wounds to lick while the Gautiers regroup in Gautier territory. The surrounding lords are skilled enough at diverting search parties before they can stumble upon a humble-looking cabin in the woods that houses Faerghus' most important people.

Sylvain's heart breaks when he sees his best friend, the boy who'd been sworn to him since the first time the sun came up, looking like hell now lived inside him.

"What are you doing? You've done your share, Dimitri. You don't have to do this anymore." You don't have to hurt yourself for me anymore. Please don't hurt for me. If you die for me, I worry that I couldn't even hate you for it.

Dimitri hasn't let go of Areadbhar since he returned. Maybe once, because eating had required it. But he sets it down in that moment and approaches so that there's no more than a handful of inches between them.

"You asked me if I was bothered by having to stay by your side. Do you think I would not have fled, across the sea or over the mountains, if I didn't want to stand where I've stood all these years?"

"But you--" But you didn't have a choice.

Dimitri looks off in the distance. "Does a hound choose to be a carnivore? A flower, to flourish in the sun?"

"Those are bodily functions, Dimitri. Don't think that counts."

"Ah. I haven't made it clear then."

Sylvain loses it a little when Dimitri leans closer.

"I breathe, and I wake, and I think of you, and if there was ever a moment of doubt that you're the cornerstone of my heart, Sylvain, I'm afraid that was an error on my part."

Sylvain wants to say something about how Dimitri could have easily had the entirety of Garreg Mach's student body chasing after him like a pack of wolves after prey, but Dimitri has willingly walked into the trap of his arms, so Sylvain is in no mood to spook him away (read: irritate him in the way Dimitri never admits to being irritated).

They have rings, Blaiddyd-silver and gems coloured Gautier-teal, that are always there under gloves and gauntlets.

People say that King Sylvain never married because he grew tired of the women that cycled through his chambers. Dimitri doesn't particularly like listening to people run their mouths that way, but protecting Sylvain from prying eyes and centuries-old expectation has always been more important than defending his honour.

[damnedrainbows]

In a world where taking a bullet to your rib cage or being treated as a cannibal’s next meal was merely an inconvenience, death was as common as the gun fights in the streets, or the fist fights in the bars. One needed to step over bloodied corpses about as often as puddles of piss and vomit.

Even with the plethora of enemies he’d amassed over these decades, Alastor’s body had never once hit the sidewalk. Oh it came close that night on the hotel roof, when he had his first indication that there had been an unseen shift in his plans. He felt his soul tremble with his reserve, but by will and stubbornness and cowardice, he’d avoided it. Now his time was running out, and the will to fight the blackness tugging at his mind was in even shorter supply.

You see, living implied there was something to be lived for, and now he had none of that. Torture and loneliness was his absolution, and…perhaps he could escape it in oblivion.

It was a stupidly absurd thought, but for a moment he wished the snake was here. He wished he had someone that could tell him what he was about to experience. Nobody knew what happened when a soul died permanently, except whoever was voided themself. Did oblivion mean he could escape Lilith? Could he escape the guilt that had been ever present and gnawing deeper than these barbs? Would he even die permanently? Would she allow that? She had no use for him now after all.

There was no use for him at all now. Hell, not even as the fucking father role he found himself in. Niffty had….Husk, and Angel. Charlie had her real father back as well. They hated him now anyway. His ties to the princess had been severed, but what good was a bodyguard that was now powerless?

Alastor’s eyes started to shut for a moment. Hell’s furnace rippled his hair and only worsened the pain of the disgrace he was. It stung at every lash. He hadn’t gotten a chance to see just how bad he looked, but he knew whoever was going to find him was in for a treat.

Lilith had decided that red really was his color, and his skin and suit was caked in it. Deep, dripping lash wounds from the scourge of a whip-

“It wasn’t intentional, Your Highness.” Strung up like a crude marionette with his limbs pulled taut—a creak as they threatened to pop from their sockets- Alastor’s ears pinned against his head. It was her favorite way to incapacitate him. The poetry of the puppeteer becoming the puppet.

“Spare me. It was. You know how easily you could have avoided this, little fawn. But you just couldn’t play nicely with the kitten now, could you? Not even for one night. And now look where that’s led you. It’s really put quite a damper on this deal, hasn’t it?”

Alastor bit down the whimpers that wanted to form as he felt them: the roots, thorned, and ebony, weaving up his body to add just an extra little flair of pain. They sliced in into various and even intimidate parts of his body and he bit back the shriek. “It hasn’t. It really hasn’t. I can still monitor the hotel from a distance. I can still monitor Charlie, and report what I find.”

She wasn’t done though. When was she ever? Alastor watched, feeling his blood freezing rigid in his veins, as her form shifted. Soon he was looking at the back of an agonizingly familiar feline. “No…please…not him.”

When she—he—turned, a dark gruff chuckle left his old friend’s mouth, and those beautiful golden eyes were more snake like than they’d ever looked. “And all because you thought we had any sort of chance at all?”

“No, I didn’t think that,” Alastor trembled out, and immediately he cursed that he’d even dared to speak to this unspeakable illusion as if it was Husk. How could he disrespect him so? “S…stop it, shift back!”

“Look at you, you’re pathetic. How could you think after everything you put me through that you and me were ever gonna have some sort of shot? No…I’d sooner do this.”

Alastor’s eyes were screwed shut now, and he clenched his canines so tightly at the whip as it scourged into his skin, that crimson ichor trickled down through his fangs. I’m not going to scream.

“Oh…you’ll scream.” Not even his thoughts were given the luxury of privacy here. “You always do.”

It was the whip that did most of the damage that session; death by a thousand cuts? Maybe. It seemed it, anyway. She grew bored eventually, and he still had patches of him that were flayed off, like he was put through some crude cheese grater. Dissociating into the bleakness of it, Alastor didn’t remember what happened through most of it. The air reeked of charred flesh though. At some point he must have been touched with flames.

Weighted under the heavy shackles, Alastor jerked when a larger shadow fell over him. Partially delirious in blood loss and mania, for a moment, he mistook the form for an angel. The beautiful, blazing gold and white was easily misleading as one. He sparkled so brilliantly, caught in crimson light, that for a moment, Alastor could merely stare.

He was lucky the amount of crimson smattering his face covered any heat that had risen. Husk’s outfit he’d sported before paled in comparison to the beauty this one emanated.

Alastor’s lips upturned a bit more, and blood spilled down his chin as they did. Wasn’t it so terribly, poetically fitting that the one he had abused the most had come to deal the finishing blow? He’d had a good run, but all shows had to end someday. He’d take no better end, and hoped this would give Husk closure.

I got to see him again…

When he spoke, it sounded like a radio on the brink of finally short circuiting. A sound of feedback, of static, and even sparks flying. “Forgive my….selfishness….a final time,” he barely buzzed out. “But please….make it quick. …I do hope this gives you what you need…”

How the deer had lingered at the bar for as long as possible afterwards, with his claws pathetically gripping the glass Husk had before, just to feel the warmth of the other until it diminished and all he was left with was a memory.

Alastor had miscalculated Husk’s final move in this game, and what his real ace was. He thought it was the Lilith card, and then he was certain it had been his abandonment. The final card he had to play came the very next day. He hadn’t left the bar, remaining in the same spot and holding a glass that had long since lost its warmth.

He already knew what had happened when Charlie stood there, authority on her sweet features, and tears clouding her eyes. His world crumbled in an instant, and the life he’d made in a year was gone. Still, he smiled. He’d cut off her sobbing lecture, figuring he’d spare them both the pain.

He wasn’t angry.

“I understand, Princess.” He’d stood and grasped his staff, bowing to the girl not out of mocking, but genuine respect. “Thank you for allowing me to be here. It’s been an honor.” If he was losing it all, then Alastor was losing it all on his terms, and no one else’s.

He’d left before she could inform the idiot it was a temporary suspension of only a month, and he’d left before he could see the horrified and guilty tears in Niffty’s eye.

He’d returned to his manor, and never had being there felt so overwhelming in grief. The halls carried the memory of a certain little bug that would skitter about chasing rats and leaping onto him while he tried to read his paper. The bar he’d allowed Husk to customize to his liking—the only spot in his house decorated in spades and hearts and diamonds-carried the memory of the bar cat that used to roll his eyes as he watched them, almost fond.

The silence, and loneliness was deafening, suffocating…but it hadn’t been for long. Lilith had wasted no time in seeking him out, none too pleased her link to her daughter had been severed by his actions. She hadn’t been merciful. On the contrary, it seemed that night and the alienation of his friends had given her plenty new ammunition.

“Poor little fawn, by himself in this forest of loneliness. Nobody is there to pick you up now. Nobody is there to protect you. When will you stop reaching for connections that you know aren’t destined for you? Your only company now is me…and this eternity.”

Alastor used to fight her. He knew it was a losing battle, but if he could just pretend to get a blow in, then at least he wouldn’t feel like helpless prey. Now however, he never fought her. If he was being honest with himself, for the first time in his life and afterlife, Alastor was losing the will to fight.

Depression was an ever present whisper that hung over this realm and it had finally found a way to sink its teeth in. He’d kept its jaws off of him before easily, through the power that gave him some sort of grounding, and the superficial friendships he formed. Now he had neither. Now he had nothing.

Alastor was like a rag doll when he was tossed like discarded trash, back in through the portal. He wasn’t sure where he had landed, honestly. It wasn’t his manor, and seemed to be somewhere outside. She probably didn’t want him to be able to get somewhere where he could lick his wounds. Sepsis sounded like a dream right now. If only death by it wasn’t fuelled with more pain.

You think you deserve a merciful end?

The thought brought forth a manic giggle, even as he coughed another bubble of blood into the asphalt and shivered from the agony. He was weighted to the ground, wrapped under the chains that were like no other, with their black, ghastly links and the interwoven thorns in each one. Fitting that even the leash itself was barbed and meant to slice.

He supposed she wanted the humiliation. She wanted whoever to find him, to end him, to know that he didn’t die a free man. He’d be found like the chained dog he was, and ended just as pathetically as one. And at this point? He welcomed the euthanasia.

@hazbinned

[gingersnaaps]

untouchable

keishin just can't stand the thought of anyone else being your first.

wc: ~2.5k

tags/tw's(PLEASE READ): noncon, explicit n*fw, alcohol, corruption of innocence, virgin!reader, mild misogyny, possessive ukai, masturbation, fingering, teasing, friends to lovers but fucked up, fem!reader with inner genitals

a/n: written for @seita and their collab! also i probably fucked up the characterization but oh well

i don't want minors interacting with my content

To Keishin, you’ve always been untouchable.

He’d grown up alongside you - seen you go from your pretty pigtails to your grown-up bob, watched you turn from a schoolgirl into a woman. And through all those years, he’d always thought you were beautiful in the way that spring flowers are, all soft and sweet and dewy, your expression dripping innocence.

You’re pure. Unblemished. Perfect.

But that doesn’t mean he’s never admired from afar.

He almost hates it, these urges he gets. Keishin sees your stupid Instagram posts, your Facebook updates - in fact, he’s practically inundated with photos of you. He can’t escape the pictures of you in your summer skirts, grinning cheekily and holding up a peace sign, or the ones of you in your sundresses, the fabric lightweight and loose, cascading over your body in ripples.

And sometimes, after spending a few hours with you in person - maybe at a concert, maybe just catching up with you as friends - these urges he gets are too much for him to control, too much for just a cold shower to tamp down. He’ll lay his head back against his pillow, groaning in relief as he palms him cock, guilt gnawing him raw as he strokes himself to thoughts of the soft swell of your breasts, the barest brush of your hand - every exposed bit of your skin that he can conjure from his memory.

He always gets this empty feeling in the pit of his stomach after.

Keishin will reprimand himself, muttering about how creepy it is, how wrong it feels, how he’ll never do it again, but soon enough, he’s seeing your pictures all over his feed again, and you’re inviting him to some new outing.

He knows it’s not right, but he can’t really stop himself, either.

So when you call him up just days later, giggling and chatting his ear off about some new amazing discount at this local bar - look, Keishin, I promise it’s not far - going on and on about how he should join you in celebrating your latest raise at work, a wave of nausea sweeps over him. He should say no. He should make up some vague excuse, awkwardly laughing, brushing off your invitation while promising to make it up to you.

But it’s just been so long since he’s seen you.

He clears his throat, and his voice comes out dry and a little unsure on the other end. “Yeah. Yeah - I can go. See you there, [y/n], okay? Take care.”

Keishin hangs up the phone with a click before you even get a chance to respond, his hand unsteady and trembling.

-

He gets there before you do.

His fingers drum nervously against the tabletops, eyes scanning above the sea of overdressed, garish bargoers, looking around for any sign of you. It’s hard to make out faces among the crowd, all finer features clouded by the smoke and mirrors that dim lighting creates, but he’s looked at you enough times to be able to tell you apart with his eyes closed.

“Hey,” your voice greets, pressed close to his left side. “Never been to a bar before or what? Just relax, Keishin. We’re here to have a good time, right?”

He startles at your sudden appearance, flinching slightly. “Right,” he responds, a smile tugging at his lips.

He beckons the bartender over, ordering a few drinks, and you get settled into a routine of easy conversation. It doesn’t take long for you to get woozy, alcohol flooding your system as your cheeks flush and vision blurs. It loosens your tongue, loosens your wallet, and before long, you start losing track of the time of the drinks you order. All you know is that it feels good to let go, to lose yourself in the light-headed headspace you’ve found yourself in, the kaleidoscope of people around you dissolving until indistinguishable, walling off the rest of the world from just the two of you.

If Keishin’s going to be completely honest, though, he’s not really paying attention to what you're saying.

He’s paying attention to the men around you.

Maybe he’s just being paranoid, but he could swear that half the bar is leering at you, eyes following every movement of your body in ways that are absolutely unacceptable. He’s not an idiot. He knows what those other guys are thinking about; he knows how their dicks are straining in their fucking pants, how their thoughts must be wandering, he knows because he’s been there before.

Because even in the middle of a bar, surrounded by debauchery and alcohol and sluts, you look absolutely angelic. The halo of hair around your head looks so, so soft - he wants to stroke it, kiss it, use it as a handle to maneuver you around for him - and suddenly he’s consumed by thoughts of how much he wants to be the one to force you down around his cock, choking and sobbing, how much he wants to smear his cum on your gorgeous face and ruin you before anyone else can get to it. He can’t tear his gaze away from you as you shift closer, wobbling on your stool, completely oblivious to the way everyone else’s eyes are undressing you.

He knows you’re not doing this on purpose. You can’t be, no matter how many times you wiggle your ass on the bar stool, no matter how far up your thigh the hem of your skirt rides up. You wouldn’t tempt others like that. You’re just not that type of girl - you’re innocent, so open and guileless - you would never.

Keishin isn’t going to let anyone else fuck that up for him.

He knows it’s only a matter of time before some sleazy man comes along, his hands groping at your body, mouth whispering sinful words into your ear, and the mere thought makes him shudder with revulsion.

No, if anyone is going to wreck you, it’s going to be him.

When you eventually get too drunk, words slurring and half delirious, he catches you in his arms and leads you stumbling back to his own car. He revels in how peaceful you look with your eyes lidded with fatigue, clinging onto his arm as he drives back to his apartment.

He takes you inside with him.

“K-Keishin..” you mutter. “Where are we?”

He shushes you softly, carrying you to his off-white bedroom of popcorn ceilings and peeling wallpaper, of warm lights dimmed low and an eerie silence that suspends your surroundings in stillness. Laying you down on his half-made bed, he tenderly brushes aside the hair that frames your face as he crawls on top of you.

“I’m taking care of you, baby.”

Your eyebrows knit in confusion at his pet name, but your mind is still too woozy to fully comprehend the meaning behind his words.

But even a drunk girl like you knows that something’s not right when warm, calloused fingertips reach beneath your skirt and slip under the hem of your panties. You instinctively flinch away from his touch, trying to close your legs back up, but he brings a knee up between your thighs to rest at your cunt.

“Please,” you whisper, sobered from the rush of dread that runs tingling down your spine. “Please, Keishin. We’re friends.”

He ignores you, pressing down on your cunt until you’re squirming beneath him, his gaze softening as your breath hitches with desperation. “You don’t have to worry. I’m gonna make this virgin cunt feel so good,” he breathes. “Gonna show you just what real sex is supposed to feel like.”

He presses his lips to yours, his kiss gentle yet insistent, lips and wet tongue probing your mouth as if he’s trying to pry you apart and open you up. You can taste the alcohol on his hot breath, puffing lightly along your jaw as he trails his mouth further down, dragging his kisses sloppily down the crook of neck to where it meets your collarbone.

You tell yourself that it’s gross, that it’s overwhelming, but it’s impossible to hide the way your clit throbs against him as he flicks his tongue out to tease at your sensitive nipples, a moan almost involuntarily slipping from your lips. His mouth curls into a playful grin, teeth scraping roughly against your tits, and brings up the palm of his hand to cup your pussy.

“See?” he says. “This feels good.”

You cringe at his words, desperately bucking away from his touch, but there’s nowhere left for you to go - one arm cages in your small, frail body, the other strokes at your clit through the fabric of your panties, his mouth is sucking and nipping at the soft flesh of your tits - he’s everywhere, drawing patterns across your skin with lips and tongue, tracing feather-light circles on your pussy until you feel that desire in your cunt pulsing with need. “No,” you whimper quietly, almost as if you’re trying to convince yourself. “No, it doesn’t.”

Keishin ignores your weak protests, because he’s much too fixated on the way you look spread out beneath him. He didn’t think he’d ever get to see you this debauched, a flush riding high on your cheeks as you turn your head away in embarrassment, your hips bucking needily into his waiting hand, hair mussed and pupils blown out with lust.

You’re not the same girl he used to idolize, now that he’s seen you like this.

“I wonder how tight your pussy is,” he muses. “It hasn’t been tainted, right? Except for when you’ve touched yourself.”

Now there’s a sight he wants to see.

He withdraws from between your legs, but he moves his large hands to pry at your thighs and hold you in place. “I want you to do it for me,” he orders. “Show me how you touch yourself.”

You feel so fucking vulnerable in this position, legs forced apart and your glistening cunt bared to his hungry gaze, completely at the mercy of his whims and fancies, your body gone almost limp with fear at the thought of what he could do.

So you follow his directions like a good little girl.

You reach a finger to the entrance of your cunt, but the angle is awkward, and when you shove it inside, you’re barely able to feel even an inch of stretch. It’s frustrating, embarrassing, humiliating to be so helpless in front of Keishin, but you swallow the shame and begin to roughly thrust a finger in and out of your dry hole, even when the ache in your cunt is screaming for something much bigger - much more satisfying - to fill you up and satiate the need throbbing in your pussy.

He clicks his tongue mockingly. “Not good enough?” he asks. Keishin can tell from the pained expression on your face, from the slight twitching of your hips every time your stubby fingers brush against your g-spot, even though your face is turned away from him, and he knows what you’re really asking for with your panting and whining.

You’re asking for him.

Sweetheart, he’s more than okay with teaching you how to do it properly.

He moves your cramped hand away from its pathetic attempt at satisfying you, bringing a thumb up to rest at your clit, relishing at the way it pulses with need after just a few light circles. “More?” he asks.

Guilt is written all over your features, your eyes darting away, fingertips curling to grip at his sheets as he presses down more firmly. The twinge of stimulation sends white-hot arousal rushing to your cunt, your brain becoming hazy and unfocused, and the only thing you can think about is wanting more, more stimulation, more of his soothing words whispered in your ear, more of his deft touches and long, thick fingers.

“Mhm,” you whimper quietly. “Yes.”

Keishin stops the movement of his thumb, the warm palm of his hand resting against your throbbing clit. “More of what?”

You shake your head, embarrassment seeping into your veins. You don’t want to say it. You can’t say it.

He dips a finger into your cunt, teasing at the entrance before trailing light, soft touches up and down your folds. “Use your words, baby. I wanna hear you say it.”

“Please,” you beg, desperation written across your face. “Touch me.”

“Where do you want me to touch you?” he asks, malice glinting in his eyes. He wants to hear you say those filthy words, wants his precious, innocent best friend to beg him to do the things he’d only ever dreamed of.

“My…” you trail off, eyes now hazy and unfocused as you blink back tears. “My pussy. Want your fingers inside my pussy.”

What a good girl.

“Knew you could do it for me,” he growls, slipping his finger deeper into your twitching hole. “When you want something, you have to learn to ask for it.”

He doesn’t hold back now, adding another thick finger inside to stroke and pet at your sensitive walls, pressing up against your g-spot firmly as his thumb rubs steady, even circles on your clit. The stimulation comes crashing down like a wave of relief for your sore, aching hole, his fingers playing with your cunt better than you ever could, reaching deeper inside you, stretching you out further, making you cream around his skilled digits until your hole is left fluttering and fucked out.

You barely have the energy to resist when he pulls out his cock, painfully hard and leaking, and fits it to the entrance of your pussy. He pushes in slowly, gently, his deliberate movement a facade of tenderness, stretching you out until the pleasure pulsing in your core becomes almost unbearable from how unhurried he’s fucking you.

“Holy shit,” he says, swearing under his breath. Keishin wishes all the other undeserving men at the bar could see you now, sprawled out on his bed like his own personal fuckdoll, your eyes rolled back into your head, gasping and moaning as he breaks in your virgin cunt. He knows he’s fucking you better than any other man ever could, wrecking you in ways you’ll think about years in future when you close the blinds and dim the lights and slip a hand between your legs.

And as he finishes, groaning in pleasure as the waves of an orgasm wash over him, he pulls out of your slippery cunt and watches as his thick spurts of cum land all over the soft, smooth skin of your chest and stomach, marking you as his.

You look so beautiful painted white.

No, maybe beautiful is the wrong word. You’d always been so pure in his eyes, so clean and untouchable, but looking down at your quivering form, he begins to finally see what he’d been to blind to all along. For the first time, he sees how slutty your tits are covered in his cum, how they’re almost pushed up to your chin when you’re lying on your back. When he squeezes at your thighs, your ass, your waist, the excess flesh spills over in all the places that make you perfect for fucking.

You’re not innocent anymore, he realizes with a sense of twisted satisfaction. Not after this.

You’ve been ruined, haven’t you?

if you enjoyed this, please reblog or just drop by my inbox to say hi!

[velveticamoon]

‘LIMERENCE IN IT’S PUREST FORM’

DAZAI OSAMU X FEM! READER

— dazai finally takes off his bandages, but with that his insecurities seem to be bubbling up to the surface, scared that his s/o’s love for him may waver because of the imprints of his past upon his skin. 

WARNINGS: angst (but turns into fluff??), mentions of suicide attempts (it’s dazai folks c’mon-), self-harm mentions, implied sex, profanity

[lowercase intended] 

A/N: was this fic my way of professing my love for dazai? yes no ofc not. this gets so painstakingly soft at the end even i’m not sure how tf that happened but hope y’all enjoy nonetheless (feedback and reblogs are appreciated!! have a lovely day folks)

“are you sure about this?” you asked as you held his hand gently in the palm of your hand, the two of you sat cross-legged in front of each other on your bed. he sat with his clothes off, shirt discarded somewhere along the floor of the bedroom, his trench coat neatly hung across the back of your desk chair. he looked calm, despite the storm that you knew was brewing within his mind.

he slightly chuckled, his eyes closed for a split second before reopening, allowing you the chance to bask in the pools of brown that were being illuminated by the moonlight filtered through the window, casting a shadow over his form in an ethereal manner. how he always managed to look beautiful, no matter what it may be that he was doing at that moment? you’ll never know, but you’d never pass up the opportunity to bask within his beauty.

“if i wasn’t sure, i wouldn’t be sitting here in front of you like this right now, belladonna,” he said, in a hushed manner, not wanting to break the atmosphere around the two of you. he flipped his hand that was facing upwards, gently intertwining your fingers as though he was trying to calm you down. but you knew he wasn’t trying to calm just you down, for the slight shake in his fingers gave him away despite his smile-graced face.

you sighed, shutting your eyes gently for a second, giving his hand a light squeeze before reopening them to look at him.

“it’s ok to be scared, you know?” you said, watching his expression morph from one of calm to surprise, to genuine relief. if there was someone he was willing to let his guard down with, even if it was merely one of the many walls he’s caged himself in that surrounded him in an everlasting maze; it might as well be you.

“i’m fine love, but the longer you linger on this feeble task, the more i’ll be tempted to just rip them off myself~,” he said in a teasing manner. when in reality he knew that if that was the case, he’d most definitely shrink back within himself, too scared to let you know what truly lies beneath the shield of his bandages.

he just didn’t want you to abandon him, for he believed that someone as ugly as him didn’t deserve to be cradled so gently within the innocence of your touch.

“i just don’t want you to feel uncomfortable, i just.. i want you to feel safe with me,” you said, eyes looking straight into his, and he saw all the unadulterated love you were pouring into his being with merely your gaze, and he almost let his breath hitch because of how overwhelmingly in love he was with you, almost.

“i want you to do it, i trust you,” he said, his voice dripping with a sense of honesty you’d never heard spilled from his lips. that small reassurance was enough for you to finally grip the ends of the everlasting bandages layered over his skin, finally tugging at the bit that would begin the anticipated unraveling of the truth that lay on his skin.

this time, his breath did hitch, your ears caught onto it, and your eyes snapped up to meet his eyes immediately. “do you want me to stop?” you asked, concern laced within your voice, and that alone made his heart melt, the initial shock of the action fading away.

he brought his hand up to stroke your cheek with his thumb, the warmth from your skin sinking into his cool hands, a soft smile tugged at his lips.

“no, i want you to keep going,” he said, and so you did.

you slowly unraveled the rest of the slightly worn-out white bandages, to the point where the pull of gravity finished the job for you. you began gently pulling away the bandages and toss them to the side, only to look back and freeze.

scars upon scars littered his pale skin; some varying in sizes, some faded, but others still fresh. but in the end, the ones that broke your heart the most were the ones engrained on his wrists, indicating that the pain had been inflicted upon him by his own hand.

your lips parted, eyes wide, the shock was ever-so evident on your face. your fingers ghosted over his skin, as though you were afraid to touch him, which in a way, you were. not because you were disgusted, but the thought of you hurting him caused you to refrain from doing so.

dazai stayed silent while watching your movements, calculating his next movements to help stimulate you but to still manage to maintain his facade, but all his thoughts got cut off as he felt you pull him into your embrace.

“i-i’m so sorry, osa, none of- fuck- none of this should’ve happened to you,” you said. dazai could only stay silent as you held him.

dazai’s mind went blank, and he could do nothing but relish in the feeling of your arms around his being, actually getting to feel you without the bandages acting as a barrier between the two of your bodies.

“something as ugly as this shouldn’t have had to even be near your skin,” you said, but despite the sentiment that dazai knew you meant with the words, he couldn’t help the feeling of them rubbing him in the wrong way.

but he didn’t say anything, he just wrapped his arms around you too, and leaned his head atop yours, closing his eyes.

‘she thinks i’m ugly..’ the thought kept running through his head, no matter how much he tried to push it away. dazai had always been one to never let his insecurities show on the surface, but this was one of those moments where he felt as though he couldn’t possibly get more vulnerable than he already was. eventually, the thought had gnawed at him enough, and he couldn’t take it anymore.

with a sigh, he pulls away from the hug and asks “do you want me to put the bandages back on?”

you look at him confused, “does something hurt? if that’s the case, then go for it. otherwise, why?”

he shrugs, averting his gaze towards the blanket that laid beneath the two of you, and says, “i don’t know, i figured because you said that you don’t think they’re beautiful.. you didn’t want to look at them anymore.”

your heart shattered, and you couldn’t help but look at him in disbelief.

“excuse me?” you asked in an exasperated tone, you genuinely couldn’t understand where that thought came from and felt guilt pool in your chest when you realized.

‘he thinks i don’t wanna look at him anymore.. because of his scars..?’

your features immediately softened, and with the way you gazed at him with tears in your eyes, one could only describe your expression as heartbroken.

you cupped his cheek with the palm of your hand and turned his face to look at you, but his eyes remained averted.

you sighed, “osamu, look at me.” you said, voice gentle but held a sternness to it that he knew he’d be an idiot to refuse to comply with.

“what in the fucking universe gave you that idea?” you said, his eyes slightly widened, lips barely parted at the way your voice shifted.

but the thing that shocked him the most was the pure determination that was spread across your features. you gazed at him with such sincerity that he felt utterly enamored by it, almost getting lost in your eyes if it weren’t for your voice bringing him back.

“your scars, although yes, i don’t think they’re beautiful, i’d never want you to hide them from me. the only reason i don’t think of them as beautiful is because of the amount of pain i can only imagine that came with them. and it's ironic, considering i know how much you hate pain.. yet you’ve had to endure so much of it,” you let out with a bitter chuckle. “it doesn’t mean i would try to turn a blind eye and move on, as though they were never there in the first place.” you paused, forcing your throat to not close up on you as you spoke, trying your damn hardest to keep your tears at bay, to stay strong, all for him. you knew that that’s what he needed the most right now, and that became all the more prominent when you noticed the tears beginning to prick at his eyes as well.

you shut your eyes and took in a deep breath, trying to recollect your thoughts, before looking back into his eyes.

“when i told you i loved you, i meant it. every word,” you said, and his breath hitched at your words, but that didn’t stop you, no.

for nothing could stop the way your heart beats for the man in front of you. no matter how ugly the scars may be that were permanently ingrained in his skin, that wouldn’t cause you to lose sight of the true beauty that lies within his soul.

“when i told you that i love you.. i made a promise to myself. to love and cherish every part of you, the good and the bad, the quirks and the flaws, the beauty, and the pain. i promised to love all of you.. even the parts you’ve come to hate yourself.” you said slowly, with a bittersweet smile lining your features, dazai could do nothing but stare at you as you spoke your heart out to him.

“..why?” was the only word he could croak out. he internally loathed how weak and feeble he sounded in that moment, how he didn’t want it to show how much of an effect you had on him with just your mere words, but that was something that he knew he’d never be able to hide. everyone in the world knew that if there was one thing dazai would never lie about, it was his love for you.

you smiled softly, and brought your other hand up to brush the messy tuft of hair atop his head back behind his ears, and leaned your forehead against his, the one that was resting against his cheek reaching down and grabbing his hand with yours and holding it against your heart. dazai’s heart fluttered at how earnest you looked in that moment.

“because.. it’s you. it doesn’t matter to me which part of you it may be.. in the end, it’s still you, and that’s all that matters to me.” you said, and he immediately connected your lips with his, as though with the simple action he was going to be able to pour all the words he wanted to say to you at that moment into your heart and mind.

and it did. it always did.

when it came to the way he kissed you, you could always tell the meaning behind each one.

the playful kisses from when he’s running away from kunikida, always coming in the form of quick and rushed pecks, only for him to continue running right after.

tender kisses to your forehead when the two of you are in the comfort of your home where you both know that no one’s watching, the kind that makes your heart flutter in the best way.

the kisses that occur when he’s managed to come back from a dangerous mission, all in one piece and he always makes sure to come back and give you a lingering kiss, to reassure you, and him, that you’re both still there and alive.

and the soft and delicate kisses to your cheeks for when he’s feeling particularly nostalgic. whether he’s reminded of something from his past, or on the days where the remembrance of his dear friend oda becomes too much to handle.

you always knew the meaning behind dazai’s kisses, and at that moment you knew that the kiss you two shared was a symbol of both of your love being poured into one another’s souls.

the two of you parted, your foreheads resting back against each other’s, breathing slightly heavy from the kiss, but that didn’t stop dazai from murmuring the words ‘i love you’ against your lips.

and he meant it, because why lie about the one thing you’ve never been more sure about in your entire life? even if he felt as though he never deserved it in the first place.

you smiled, and he’d forever feel entranced by the way the moon now cast its glow along the features he’d always found himself to be completely infatuated with. the way your hair graced and complimented your entire being only added to that infatuation.

“i love you too, my beautiful prince.” your lips captured his once again. “let me show you just how much,” you murmured against his lips as you started to gently push him back towards the bed, trailing gentle kisses along anywhere your lips could reach.

and dazai knew, no matter how many times the world may lie to him, that if there was one thing he could always believe in, it was the love the two of you shared, for it was more than love.

»»————　　————««

dazai let his thoughts wander as the two of you laid next to each other, basking in the feeling of your naked bodies tangled up within the sheets, and he watched as you littered gentle kisses along his wrists, kissing each of his scars that your lips could reach.

his heart swirled in a sensation that he could only describe as peace. _no, _it felt like more than that.

“hey, y/n..” he quietly called out. you stopped your actions, humming in response and tilting your head up to face his, which was now staring at the ceiling of your bedroom.

“what’s a word that might describe the way i’m feeling right now?” he asked, you scooted up the bed, raising yourself onto your elbow to begin playing with his hair.

“i don’t know osa, you’re the only one that can answer that,” you said, and he hummed, shutting his eyes and reveling in the feeling of you toying with his hair. “if you want to know, there might be a word to describe how i’m feeling though?” you suggested, and he fluttered his eyelids open to look at you.

“of course, belladonna, what are you feeling?” he asked, a soft smile gracing his features.

“limerence,” you said, and he tilted his head in a questioning manner, not understanding the meaning since the word you had spoken was in english. you lightly chuckled, and said, “it’s an english word, meaning ‘to be infatuated or obsessed with another person,’ and i think it’s pretty fitting, don’t you?”

he smiled even brighter at you and pulled you closer to his body so that you were now laying on his chest.

“limerence, that's this moment.. in its purest form, no? that’s what i feel, at least,” he said, and you hummed in agreement, that’s all you felt in that moment while resting in his arms.

how beautiful is it that someone could make your heart beat so fast, while remembering the times when you didn’t want it to beat at all?

[ao3komorii]

About Time (Timeskip Dimitri/Reader)

Decided to start transferring my works over, starting with my oldest oneshot from ao3 with Dimitri! It’s technically Dimileth since I like the Dimitri pairing from Byleth’s position, but it’s fully in 2nd person and I don’t use any names for Reader or anything. 

This oneshot was entirely born from having a thought of “what if Dimitri accidentally saw Byleth’s boobs and then freaked out.” Also, this one is set after Dimitri comes out of his emo phase, but before the final battle in the BL route. Just a note, there is sex at the end. Enjoy :)

----

You did not find yourself in over your head much anymore these days, but you also had a talent for finding new trouble.

You had been backed into a corner by multiple soldiers, and a horrible giant beast. The beast’s jaw opened slowly, revealing its gleaming teeth, dripping with a black substance as the soldiers by its side advanced, lances drawn and all pointed towards you. The Sword of the Creator at your side was growing weary, and you knew that it would not be enough to defeat the enemies in front of you.  

You knew that your former students were on the battlefield somewhere, but you couldn’t see them beyond the great beast that caged you in by the wall. Either way, this was too dangerous a situation for them anyways. You could only hope they would stay away. Use the chance to escape while this creature feasted on your flesh and gnawed on your bones. You didn’t want to die, but you would not allow yourself to be the cause of any of your students’ deaths. It would break you. If anyone had to die, it should be you.  

You held up your sword, ready to fight back, but the onslaught still overwhelmed you. You were able to quickly take out a few soldiers with the last remaining swipe of your mythic sword’s power before their lances got too close to you. You had no time to bask in your small victory as your sword refused to spring into action after your first swipe, only functioning as an average sword, and a dull one at that, as it lost all its power. And with its elongation use now locked away from you, you would only be able to defend yourself from close range.  

This immediately proved deadly for you, as you swerved to avoid the creature’s teeth, but found yourself on the receiving end of an enemy’s lance as it sunk in and out of your shoulder. You screamed with pain and shock as you sunk down to your knees, dropping your sword to press a hand over your wound. It hurt so badly, and you looked up as a shadow loomed over you to see the monster and remaining soldiers all radiating with the satisfaction that they were about to snuff your life out. You couldn’t even gather the strength to pick your sword back up, the pain in your shoulder was too great. Even moving your hand sent unbearable jolts of pain up and down your arm. You could do nothing but watch, eyes drawn to the lance of the soldier that had stabbed you, what must be your blood dripping off the tip and onto the ground.  

You felt all hope leave your mind as the abomination’s jaw opened wide, preparing to blast you with fire. Too weary to continue looking up, you turned your head down in defeat, hoping that your death would at least come fast. You heard a loud shout, but it was not enough to keep you from falling on your side, no strength left in your body to allow you to remain up. Your eyes slid closed, and death felt imminent.  

You felt like you were fading, and the sounds around you faded along with your hazy consciousness. There were sounds of screams and horrible growls, but you didn’t know what they meant, and couldn’t really rationalize anything but the extreme pain you felt. There was so much screaming and so much pain. It was hard to even think at all.  

“Professor!”  

A voice broke through your haze at about the same time you felt the pain lessen by a small fraction. You heard your name called, with more insistency, and you felt annoyed. You just wanted the pain to end so you could sleep. The pain was so great that in that moment you didn’t mind dying if it would end the pain.  

“If she falls unconscious, we won’t be able to save her!” You heard a soft-voiced woman assert.  

“Professor!” the calls of your name and title got louder, and more insistent, and your forehead felt wet as one voice rang out louder than the rest. “Please, Professor, I can’t lose you too...”  

The pain lessened a little more, becoming less all-encompassing, and you allowed your eyes to open. You found your vision blurry until a warmth took over the feeling of pain in your shoulder. A call of your name focused your attention directly above you.  

Dimitri was crying. It was the first thing that struck you as you gazed up at him, tears freely flowing from his uncovered eye. His eye lit up when you looked at him, and you felt the world beneath you shift.  

“Dimitri!” an airy voice angrily broke the quiet. “Don’t move!”  

You were confused, and moved your head, unintentionally shifting your shoulder and sending a wave of pain through it as you went limp against Dimitri’s lap, where you found yourself realizing that your head was resting in. You closed your eyes tightly in response to the return of extreme pain, much worse than you had ever felt before.  

“Professor, not you too! You must not move!” the woman insisted.  

Your mind felt clearer once the pain faded again to a dull ache and the warm feeling took over. You realized at once who that voice was, and you opened your eyes to look at Mercedes, who was by your injured shoulder sending healing magic into the wound. That explained the familiar feeling that you couldn’t place. She met your gaze, unable to form her usual smile as she turned back to focusing on your wound. That confused you, and you turned your head ever so slightly to look at your injury without agitating it again.  

You understood Mercedes’ current urgency. Your shoulder looked horrible. There was a large rip in the shoulder of your cloak, likely ripped further by Mercedes in an effort to get better access to the wound. There was so much blood, it matted the ripped fabric around your wound to your skin, making the area feel sticky.  

Most worrying was the blood nearest to the wound, if it was even your blood, was bleeding an oily black. Mercedes wiped a hand over the wound, clearing it to reveal a patch of gray skin surrounding the stab wound.  

“What is that?” Came Ashe’s panicked voice.  

“The enemy’s lance was poisoned, clearly,” Felix stated with a short glance behind him.  

You looked beyond where you were to realize that the area behind where you lay was covered in the bodies of the enemies that had just been closing in on you. The great beast was killed with no mercy, some of its limbs meters away from its actual body. You couldn’t stand to look at what was done to the Imperial soldiers; some with deep slashes, charred, or with arrows sticking out of their heads. It looked horrible, but not unusual for the battles you regularly faced.  

“But poison couldn’t work this fast!” Annette protested.  

“I’ve heard of weapons being enchanted with poison before,” Ashe explained.  

“Enchanted with poison...” Dimitri echoed, expression tense. “What does it look like to you, Mercedes?”  

Mercedes looked up from your wound to meet Dimitri’s eyes, but quickly looked back down. “Her wound isn’t responding to my magic. If we don’t do something, I fear she may die.”  

Mercedes looked sad and scared, but Dimitri’s growl brought your attention back to him in an instant.  

“There has to be something we can do to save her!” His desperate gaze morphed into one of hatred, one you thought you had seen the last of after Rodrigue’s death. “Tell me who I must kill and I will do it.”  

“Spoken like a boar,” Felix interjected. “You think she has the time for you to go on a murderous rampage?”  

“Felix...” Ingrid protested lowly and sadly.  

“Then what would you have me do, Felix?” Dimitri replied, anger clear in his voice. “She is dying, you can’t expect us to do nothing!”  

“I expect you not to-” Felix started.  

“Stop it!” Annette cried. “You guys need to listen to Mercie!”  

Mercedes nodded toward her best friend as Felix and Dimitri reluctantly went quiet. “There is one way to save her, but we will need everyone’s help.”  

“Me and Mercie came up with a plan!” Annette smiled softly at Mercedes, expression belying a reluctant confidence. “Healing magic can’t touch it, but regular magic should be able to negate its effects enough for healing to work on it again!”  

“And the only magic strong enough to fend off this dark poison is Annie’s fire,” Mercedes explained. “Annie will burn off the infection, and then I will heal the wound.”  

“You want to burn her?” Sylvain implored, shocked. “I know she’s tough, but...”  

“We don’t have the time to think of any other solution,” Ingrid said sadly, gesturing towards you. “Grey is spreading down her arm.”  

Everyone’s eyes shot over to your arm, and you lazily swept your gaze over as well to see that the grey skin tone had travelled down your arm, halfway towards your elbow. The grey patches looked rough, and unlike any affliction you had ever seen before. You wondered if the Imperial army had been exploring darker methods to kill than simple weaponry and monsters. It didn’t surprise you, but you should have seen it coming.  

“What do we do...?” Ashe asked quietly, as if he wasn’t ready to hear the answer.  

“You all must hold her down while Annette burns the infection away,” Mercedes answered. “It will be very painful, but if she moves, she could get hurt, so you must keep her still.”  

Dimitri looked torn as he brushed some stray hairs from your face. Even through the excruciating pain, the gesture embarrassed you. Dimitri looked to be mentally weighing options as a stray tear slipped from his chin to drop on your neck. The tear was a momentary relief, a distraction, but Mercedes couldn’t keep you from feeling all the pain in your shoulder, her healing magic seemingly less and less effective by the second as the pain began to grow stronger.  

“Professor,” Dimitri said, trying but failing to keep emotion out of his voice. “What do you want us to do?”  

You didn’t trust your ability to talk at the moment, and so you kept eye contact with him and nodded the best you could, which ended up being two slow rises and falls of your head. You could only hope that he understood what you were trying to say. He stared at you for a few seconds before he broke eye contact.  

“Dedue, Felix, take her legs,” he instructed, and the two men moved quickly towards your lower half. “Ingrid, Sylvain, take an arm each.”  

The four requested students each their place at one of your limbs, and Dimitri slowly let you out of his lap, your head now resting on the ground as he made his way over to Annette and Mercedes by your injured shoulder. “I will ensure she does not move her shoulders.”  

“Um...” Ashe spoke up hesitantly. “It’s not much, but I brought along a book I’ve been reading, and she might need something to bite down on, so she doesn’t bite off her tongue.”  

He offered the book to Dimitri, who accepted it gratefully, and with no choice, you bit down on it when Dimitri brought it to your mouth. You would have been embarrassed if you weren’t so anxious about the somehow worse pain to come. At Dimitri’s signal, your legs and arms were restrained, ensuring that you could not move them at all. When he checked that everyone had a secure hold on you, Dimitri put one hand on your uninjured shoulder, and one on your upper chest, just above your breasts. His head was just above yours, his long hair tickling your cheeks.  

“Just keep looking at me,” he whispered, voice then rising in volume. “Annette, now.”

Annette didn’t reply, but she didn’t have to. Seconds after Dimitri’s words, you felt the worst pain you have ever felt in your entire life, putting the extreme pain from before to shame. You wanted to scream, but you knew you shouldn’t, even in your haze of pain. You just bit down on the book as hard as you could to compensate. Someone held one of your hands and you squeezed their hand as hard as you could, which must have been painful, but they didn’t pull away or let go of your hand.  

A whisper of your name had you looking back up to Dimitri’s face. He looked fairly upset, but the intense levels of pain you were experiencing kept you from being able to reassure him. He smiled, a clearly forced smile, but didn’t look away from you at all, which gave you no insight into how it was going with your shoulder aside from the momentous pain, which was so hot that it now felt cold. The pain was so white hot that you had to close your eyes, teeth digging into the book’s cover.  

“You’ll be alright, professor,” Dimitri said quietly. “We can’t lose you.”  

You knew that your students would be destroyed if you died here. You knew that they would all fall apart. So you endured the pain quietly, you had no other choice. You couldn’t leave them alone after all you had all been through. You tried to stay still, but suddenly the brutal pain increased tenfold. You screamed around the book, trying to thrash your limbs, but your students remained steadfast, restricting your movement.  

“Annette!” Dimitri barked, taking his gaze from you but not his hands, which kept you pressed down.  

“I’m sorry, it’s... it’s fighting against my magic! Professor, I’m so sorry!” she replied tearfully.  

“We have to keep going, Annie,” Mercedes’ voice broke through the panic. “She has no chance if we don’t keep trying!”

With that, the incredible pain returned, and you once again regained the unpleasant taste of the book cover in your mouth as your teeth sank into the dents you had made previously. Everyone was so quiet while Annette and Mercedes worked that you could hear everyone’s breathing, and Dimitri sounded close to hyperventilating with how heavy his breaths sounded. You looked up at him, but he was looking over at your injury, not at you. He looked like he was about to cry again, and it being due to your strategic negligence was weighing on you at the moment.  

He wouldn’t look at you and looked openly panicked. You thought he would eventually feel your eyes on him, but he didn’t. He just continued to stare at the work being done on your shoulder, which you couldn’t see yourself because Mercedes and Annette blocked your sight of it entirely. You were getting used to the horrific pain at this point, so you managed to remain still. Maybe Sothis helped with your pain tolerance, since you knew that even with the pain levels you had experienced in your life, an average person could not possibly remain as still as you were able to during this kind of a procedure.  

“Mercie!” Annette cried.  

At once, the burning started to fade, as the familiar feeling of Mercedes’ magic took over, engulfing your shoulder in a light so bright that you turned your head away from it and closed your eyes. There were gasps and murmured words all around you and all at once you had a range of movement in your limbs again as everyone released their tight holds on you. Dimitri, however, kept his hands where they were, and you assumed he would wait until he knew that you would be okay.  

Annette and Mercedes finally backed up from your sider, allowing you a glance at your shoulder. There was nothing, not even a scratch, or the third-degree burns you were expecting from the fire magic. The grey patches of skin had receded entirely with Annette’s eradication of the strange poison magic. You were in awe of Mercedes’ magic, but you were far from the only one who was.  

“Remind me not to get too far away from you on the battlefield, Mercedes!” Sylvain joked.  

Sylvain’s words brought Dimitri out of his stupor and he finally released his hold on you as you reached a hand up to remove the now soggy and dented book from your mouth. You weren’t sure what to do with it since Ashe would clearly not want it back now.  

You sat up as everyone else began standing up, your muscles screaming in protest. From the pain that riddled your shoulder from all that had been done to it to the soreness in your limbs from being held down by people who put all of their strength into keeping you still, you were in pain, but not deathly pain. You waved off the chorus of worried voices asking if you were okay; you were just sore, not dying!  

Ignoring their protests, you slowly stood up, only for an arm to slide around your waist. Ready to scold Sylvain for choosing now of all times to flirt, you looked over to see a stubborn Dimitri gazing back at you, frowning with concern. It wasn’t like he had no caring before you were able to bring him out of his ten-year thirst for revenge, but he almost went overboard with how much he showed that everyone mattered to him now. And with that knowledge, you knew you weren’t about to win whatever argument he was about to start about your safety.  

“Be careful, Professor!” he chided, refusing to let go of your waist even as were found you were able to stand properly. Not without soreness, but properly enough. “You can ride back to the monastery with me.”  

You could walk just fine... probably. Your hesitation to accept must have shown on your face, because it started another bickering war.  

“She’s fine without you being a mother hen,” Felix stated dryly.  

“Felix!” Dimitri admonished, not removing his hold on you. “She was barely alive moments ago, and you want her to walk all the way back to the monastery?”  

“In case you haven’t noticed, her shoulder is fine. Do you think she wants you to baby her when she spent months trying to get you to behave like a person and not an animal?” Felix retorted.  

You would rather try to walk, to help preserve your pride, but you didn’t have the chance to speak up before the two started fighting. You weren’t sure how to break up this fight before it got worse, but luckily it was resolved for you.  

“And you two think arguing about this is going to make her feel better?” Ingrid said angrily, making her way over to you. “She will ride back with me.”  

Felix scoffed and turned away, while Dimitri went silent, allowing Ingrid to put your arm around her neck as she led you over to her waiting pegasus. You would have time to thank everyone for their help later. The whole experience and then the arguing had tired you out, and you just wanted to rest. So you got on the pegasus ahead of Ingrid and allowed her to take you back to the monastery, where you could get some sleep and recover.  

You were pushing yourself too hard and you knew it. You were still unhappy with how you had fared in the battle with Imperial troops a week before.  

And here you were, a few days later, training in the rain in the forest just outside the monastery. You had been swarmed by the students worrying about you, and your sword hand was itching to get back into practice. Nobody would agree to train with you due to your being in recovery, and Dimitri had insisted that you rest immediately, somehow even more protective of you than he had been when you were actually injured. You understood their worry, but it was getting tiring being told to rest, so you went to practice outside of the monastery to avoid everyone’s worry.  

Just your luck that it was raining, but there were battles still to be fought, so you couldn’t slack on your training. You were going stir crazy, and so you found a dead tree and began practice. The dead tree was considerably more dead looking several hours later, now bearing many stabs and slashes across it. You finally took a break and sat against the tree, surrounded by bark that littered the ground around you, dislodged from your training.  

You swiped a hand under your bangs with disgust. You hadn’t realized how sweaty you had gotten, but it felt nice to do some solo training the way you used to before you became a teacher. You were tired but felt assured that you were maintaining your sword skills even after sustaining such an injury. The rain was pouring even harder now, though you hadn’t noticed until you took a break. It must have been evening now, but with the harsh weather, it was hard for you to tell at all. The rain didn’t bother you, so you continued to lean against the tree, clothes totally soaked, but feeling at peace in that moment.  

You knew you couldn’t stay out there forever, and so you finally sheathed your sword and stood up. Casting one last glance at the dead and beaten tree, you set back off towards the monastery. Nobody else was outside due to the awful rain, and even the merchants had temporarily closed shop. The gatekeeper, determined to do his job regardless of weather, was just under the archway and greeted you with surprise, noting your soaking wet form. You gave him a smile and reassured him that you were alright, and then continued on your way back to your room to rest for the night.  

Your route back to your room took you through the entryway where you were greeted by various students and members of the church alike, who all noticed your current condition. You walked by them with a smile, brushing off their questions, until you passed by Dedue, who was just outside the dining hall. Or you tried to, as he casually stepped in your way, causing you to stop short to avoid bumping into him. You looked up at him, confused.  

“Professor,” he greeted. “Are you alright?”  

You nodded, not sure where this was going as you went to go into the dining hall, and he moved to block your way again. “His Highness has been looking for you.”  

“...why?” you asked. You had seen Dimitri earlier, so what had happened in the past few hours that he needed you for?  

“No one has been able to find you for the past eight hours,” Dedue answered. “His Highness is worried.”  

Past eight hours? It had only been a few hours... at least, that was what you had thought. You had been told before that you got really focused when you trained, but you didn’t think you had taken four hours, let alone double that time!  

You thanked Dedue for the information, and he only moved out of your way when you agreed that you would go meet Dimitri immediately outside your room, where Dedue told you the king had decided to wait for your return. Heaving a mental sigh, you crossed through the crowd of people getting a late dinner and made your way to your room. Just getting to the block of rooms, you noticed the broad figure with unruly blonde hair right where Dedue said he would be. Looking at his figure, you remembered your initial shock at his transformation, but it had been overpowered at the time with relief that he was still alive after five years of war. As if he could hear your footsteps over the sound of the rain, he turned his head to face you as you made your way over to him.  

“Professor... where were you?” he asked, and you couldn’t think of what to reply, so he pressed onward. “You think me reckless, but you go out to train in the pouring rain when you are not yet fully recovered?”  

You were surprised; how did he know?  You must have looked startled because his serious expression melted away with a genuine laugh as he reached a hand out to brush along your hair, or so you thought. He brought his hand away from your hair to show you and you stared at the twig that he held in his hand, the bark of the twig rotten and dead, much like the tree it had come from.  

“I can’t think of any other activities you would do in the rain with your sword at your side and end up with this twig in your hair,” he remarked. “You know, it usually is the professor that lectures their students about working too hard.”  

“You haven’t been my student in a long time,” you mused.  

“You may not be officially our professor, but we all rely on you for so much,” he replied thoughtfully. “You cannot expect us to not worry when our professor works herself to the point where she is liable to pass out from exhaustion in the woods without telling anyone where she has gone.”  

You immediately felt sheepish. He really had you there. You wouldn’t be able to face them if you had been abducted or killed when you had told nobody where you were going or what you were doing.  

“Please don’t look like that,” he implored you. “I am not mad. We just don’t want anything to happen to our favorite professor.”  

It seemed like they would all keep calling you professor, even though you were all equals now. You had some really stubborn former students, you mused with a smile. Dimitri then reluctantly allowed you off the hook so you could get some rest. You both said your goodnights as you went into your room and Dimitri left for his. As you stripped yourself of your heavy, wet cloak and armor and climbed into your bed, you resolved to be a little less reckless with your training. You also wondered how long you could keep such a promise in times such as this.  

It was hot. So hot. It was all that consumed your mind and body. Suddenly you realized that you had woken up. And you were only wearing a top and shorts, but you were burning up. With a groan, you assessed the situation. You felt sluggish, and so, so warm. Your throat felt sore and sitting up in your bed made you feel nauseous, so you quickly laid back down. You had to face facts; you were clearly sick.  

You knew it had to be the rain. You were outside in the rain for eight hours and overexerted yourself. The combination was a bad idea, but unfortunately you did not see it like that at the time, so here you were. Sick and feeling miserable, unable to get out of bed for fear of throwing up. You didn’t even know what time it was, but you knew that being awake was doing you no favors. You didn’t feel like being awake in this state anyways, so you had only one choice. Gardening and tea parties would have to wait until you didn’t feel like you had just drank poison.  

The feverish heat you felt kept you from sleeping however, which made you even more miserable. Feverish and now irritated that you couldn’t get to sleep, you decided to just remove your top and chest wrappings, your shorts taken off as well for good measure. You had never slept in just your underwear at the monastery before for fear of someone barging in your room without knocking, but at this point you didn’t care. Seteth’s lectures about propriety be damned. You just wanted to be less overwhelmingly warm, and so you laid back down in just your underwear, not bothering to put the blanket back on and curling up in the hopes that sleep would finally come.  

“I’ve had that one before! Remember when we had that visiting professor at the sorcery school? I think she made these for us!” Annette exclaimed excitedly.  

Mercedes nodded as she flipped the page of the new sweets book they had purchased at the market, and they both stared curiously at the next page.  

“Ooh, I always wanted to make some of those!” Annette said, pointing at the colorful pastries that were illustrated on the page.  

“Me too, Annie! We really should make some to share with everyone,” Mercedes replied.  

Their excited chatter was interrupted as Dimitri strode by their table in the dining room for what Annette estimated was likely the fifteenth time that day. He had hardly eaten what would be considered a basic nutritional amount of dinner before he resumed his cycles around the monastery.  

“Dimitri!” Annette called out to him as he was about to pass them to leave the dining hall, and he stopped in front of them. “ Mercie and I were thinking of making some sweets and having a little party with everyone!”  

Dimitri seemed distracted as he responded. “Oh, Annette... that would be...”  

“Are you alright, Dimitri?” Mercedes interjected. “You look like you have something on your mind.”  

“Oh...” Dimitri replied stiffly, coming out of his thoughts for a moment. “Has the professor been by here?”  

“No,” Mercedes shook her head. “I haven’t seen her all day.”  

“Is she okay? Do you want us to help look for her?” Annette pressed, sweets book all but forgotten in worry.  

“She should be fine...” Dimitri trailed off. “Sorry for bothering you both, your idea sounds wonderful.”  

And before either woman could protest, Dimitri exited the dining hall in a hurry, not even glancing behind him, cape fluttering with his movement. Mercedes and Annette could only watch in a haze of confusion and concern, their questions unanswered.  

If you were out training in secret again after overworking yourself in the rain the previous day... no, Dimitri dismissed the thought. He had already looked in the forest and located the tree that you had cut to ribbons the day before. You could have gone farther into the forest, but he thought that unlikely as well. You had seemed regretful when the two of you had spoken at your door the night before, and he thought it unlikely that you would immediately break a promise to him, especially after he had told you how much you and your health mattered to all of them.  

It occurred to him just then that he had neglected to check your room. It should have been the first place he checked, but it had slipped his mind. He would have to go check now. You may have decided to relax in your room for the day, and then he would have been worrying for nothing. Although he knew that you had a healthy appetite, but nobody had seen you in the dining hall at all, which was very strange.  

There was nobody at the dorms, or if they were, they must have been inside their rooms. Dimitri was able to arrive at your door with no hassle, but he couldn’t hear any sounds from inside. He knocked politely, but to no response at all.  

“Professor?” he called out as he knocked again, louder this time.  

There was still no reply, which vexed him. If you didn’t want to see anyone, you would have replied to inform him of that. Which left only one thought running wild in his mind; you must have gone out to train and been injured. Or been injured yesterday and were now in too bad or a state to even talk. Once the thought entered his mind, he was consumed with worry. Reaching out and finding the door locked, he did not spare any thought before he slammed his shoulder into the door, bursting open the lock. Without a moment to spare, he thrust open the door and rushed into your room.  

“Professor-” Dimitri exclaimed, but his eye widened in shock as he took in the scene in front of him.  

The room looked fairly normal , a similar state of cleanliness to what it had been the last time he had visited you here for tea. Your blanket was half draped on the end of the bed and half on the floor, but none of your sparse belongings were out of place.  

Dimitri found you immediately, and his cheeks immediately felt hot. You did not appear to be injured, and he was easily able to discern this because of your lack of clothes. You were curled up on your bed... in only your smallclothes. Dimitri’s mind went blank as his focus was drawn to your bare breasts. He didn’t know what to do, and he felt like he couldn’t breathe. He knew what breasts looked like, but he couldn’t remember seeing any bare but yours at this exact moment. He was transfixed, even though every instinct of his was telling him he had to look away, to protect your modesty.

And then you moaned and brought him out of his stupor. Now that he thought about it, you did not look very well. Still unsure if he was making the right decision, he closed the door behind him before making his way over to you. He removed a glove and placed his hand on your forehead, having his suspicions confirmed. You were burning up, clearly sick from training in the rain for so long the day before. He presumed that you had not left your room the entire day, which did not seem good, considering you must have spent the entire day unconscious and fevered.

He wanted to cover you up, for the sake of his waning composure, but you didn’t have the time for that and he didn’t want to overheat you further. He would have to try to disregard his embarrassment for the moment, because you needed his help, and he didn’t know how to explain to one of the women around the monastery that he had busted down your door and found you nearly naked. And you would never forgive him if he had others see you compromised like this. It was already bad enough that he had seen you like this.

He quietly left your room, glancing around to confirm that nobody was around to see him coming and going from your room so late. It was a cold night, but it did nothing to calm him down at all. Your body was beautiful, and he couldn’t get it out of his mind as he fetched a small bucket of water and a cloth before returning to your room. He mentally braced himself before opening the door to find you in pretty much the same position you had been in, laying on your back.

Prioritizing his worry for you over his shyness, he closed the door gently behind him and walked over to your bedside. He carefully wet the cloth, wringing some of the excess water out before moving your bangs to the side and placing the cloth on your forehead. You exhaled loudly but evenly in your sleep, which he took to be a positive sign.

He ended up not getting a lot of sleep that night. He stayed in your room for quite a while into the early hours of the morning, dunking the cloth in the cold water again whenever it began to be overcome by your body temperature. He never felt his lack of sleep at all, practice, he assumed, from all of his sleepless nights spent longing for revenge. He had never slept as well as he had since he had allowed himself to be free of the burdens of his dead loved ones. Not free from his obligations to them, but now he would channel his resolve into freeing Fódlan from Edelgard’s tyranny as opposed to the mindless bloodshed that he had surrounded himself with for the majority of the past five years.

You were such a comfort to him, one he thought he had lost a long time ago. You had supported him and been by his side, and he was too consumed to appreciate it until after he lost Rodrigue. He wouldn’t make the same mistake again. Not with you and all of his former classmates and friends surrounding him. They did not want him to be consumed and lost to revenge, and now he understood that the dead did not want that either. But he was not free from the choices he knew he would have to make soon, it was something that weighed on his mind. He did not want to kill his stepsister, but as he went to wet the cloth again, he was glad you would be with him when he made that decision. He needed your support, and he resolved to support you as well as he could, especially given your recent hobby of being reckless with your own health and safety.

Feeling your forehead, he was relieved to discover that your fever had finally broken. You may not have been fully healthy again, but if you were at least a normal temperature now, then he knew that he had done his job. You were still nearly naked though, and he would likely be an unwelcome sight when you woke up, and so he took the cloth and bucket and stood up. Better that you did not know he had been here; it would spare at least you of the embarrassment. But as he quickly fixed the lock back into place before opening the door and closing it behind him, he knew it would be a difficult feat to erase the sight of your uncovered body from his mind any time soon. You were so pretty, and it was all he could think about the entire way back to his room.

You woke up slowly, eyes still closed but aware that you were now awake. Your middle of the night wakeup felt almost like a dream compared to how you felt now. You felt somewhat bad still, your throat not fully better and limbs still feeling a bit heavy, but the incredible fever you had felt earlier had all but faded. You must have really been doing poorly, because a glance outside the window told you that it was morning.

You supposed that you might as well get up; there was no way to assuage worry except going to interact with everyone. You would feel better eventually. You knew that the students would worry about you. Getting up and checking with your calendar, you discovered that you had spent an entire day and night in bed.

You slowly put your clothing back on, happy to discover that it had dried all the way, pretty much a given as it had lain in a heap for over a full day on your floor. You probably looked awful after your high fever, so you headed out of your room and towards the bathhouse to freshen yourself up. Just as you went to enter, Ingrid was leaving, her hair obviously wet, and you exchanged smiles as you passed by each other.

The bathhouse was almost completely empty, save a few women, but none of your students. It made sense that there weren’t a lot of people up this early in the morning. There had just been a big battle, and there were still more to come. Everyone worked so hard, so you felt that they more than deserved to sleep in if they wanted to. But you were more than happy to finally be free from your bed, and so you stripped down and got into the water in just your towel.

You took your time to wash your hair and body, happy to not feel gross for the first time in a while. Only after scrubbing yourself to your utmost satisfaction did you relent and get redressed, leaving the bathhouse behind and feeling fully refreshed. Stifling a yawn, you decided to head over to the dining hall as your stomach yearned for food after so long without.

“Good morning, Professor,” Mercedes greeted you as you both entered the dining hall together. “Did you also hear that they would be including sugar scones in today’s breakfast menu?”

You hadn’t heard anything about menus at all, but any food sounded good to you at this point. You couldn’t remember if you had eaten sugar scones before, but they sounded like something you would like. You and Mercedes walked up to the front of the hall together, both accepting a plate of assorted muffins and colorful scones that were sparkling with sugar.

“Oh, I just love these!” Mercedes spoke cheerily as the two of you found a free section of table and sat down across from each other. “Have you had sugar scones before, Professor?”

You shook your head no and she giggled. “Well, I would recommend spreading some Albenian berry jam on them,” she informed you happily, gesturing to the small dish of red jelly that was situated in the middle of your plate. “These are one of Annie’s favorites, so I thought she would be here by now…”

As if on cue, Annette burst through the doorway to the dining hall, almost tripping as she skidded to a stop just in time to turn and rush towards the dining hall staff for her tray of breakfast sweets. She waved happily at you and Mercedes as she passed you to get to the front. The two of you watched, amused, as Annette was scolded by the head chef for running in the dining hall. She sheepishly apologized and received her tray of sweets, which brought a smile back onto her face as she turned and made her way over to you, taking a seat next to Mercedes.

“Sorry I’m late! I thought scone day was tomorrow!” Annette explained as she took in the sight of her breakfast tray.

“You’re so forgetful, Annie,” Mercedes teased with a smile.

“Well at least I got here in time!” Annette huffed, wasting no time in smearing jam all over one of her scones and taking a big bite out of it.

“That is true,” Mercedes agreed, before turning her head to look at you. “Do you like them, Professor?”

You had tried a bite while they were talking, spreading the jam like Mercedes had suggested, and found that you did like them. You must have missed it when these had been served in the dining hall before. You had eaten an entire scone by the time Mercedes had asked the question, and you were interrupted before you could answer her.

“Mind if I join you ladies?” Sylvain asked from behind you.

“Of course, Sylvain,” Mercedes replied, and he slid in right next to you with his own plate of food that he placed down in front of himself.

“I feel like I missed seeing your pretty face around here the past few days,” Sylvain said, popping an entire scone in his mouth as he looked over at you.

“You never change, do you?” Ingrid said wearingly as she sat down on your other side. “You think that she hasn’t had enough of your behavior already?”

“Ingrid…” Sylvain groaned. “She got a hole cut out of her not that long ago, I just want to make sure she’s okay.”

“And you thought your flirting would heal her wounds?” Felix raised an eyebrow as he sat down next to Mercedes. “You delusions never end.”

“Hey, why is everyone turning on me?” Sylvain complained, and you laughed. “Not you too, Professor! You wound me!”

Now Annette and Mercedes laughed, while Felix rolled his eyes and Ingrid smiled and shook her head. You all ate your breakfast while chatting, slowly adding Ashe and Dedue to your midst. Even when Dedue didn’t appear to be coming to sit with your group, Annette called his name and beckoned him over to join your table, while Ashe was convinced as soon as he saw your group all together. It was very lively, and almost made you forget that there was a war looming over you all. But just because you would soon have to kill or be killed yet again did not mean that you couldn’t enjoy the company of your lively house members.

“Hey, shouldn’t Dimitri be up by now?” Annette wondered out loud.

“That’s true,” Ingrid agreed. “He’s never been one to sleep in.”

“I can go and check his room,” Dedue volunteered. “If he is not there, then he may-”

“No need!” Annette replied. “I see him now! Dimitri, over here!”

The tall blonde king had just walked into the dining hall, and looked your way at Annette’s call, noticing your entire group all sitting together and walking over to approach you all. Before anyone could stop him or insist that he didn’t have to, Dedue was up from his seat to grab Dimitri a plate of breakfast from the cooks at the front. Some other people stopped Dimitri to talk quickly or greet him, and so he arrived at your table just as Dedue had brought back a plate for him, which he accepted gratefully, knowing better than to try to dissuade his friend from performing errands without being asked by this point. He sat down next to Dedue, and Annette got up to bring over some tea to share with everyone. It was the most cheerful that you all had been during this time of war, and you could not recall a time when you had been happier.

You talked with Ingrid about how her pegasus was doing, and she happily invited you to come flying with her if you would like, to which Mercedes and Annette chimed in that they would love to fly with her as well. Meanwhile, Sylvain on your other side informed you that his horse was available for riding lessons as well, to which Ashe mentioned that he wanted to improve his riding skills, and Sylvain looked marginally defeated. You were having so much fun talking with everyone that you didn’t notice anything amiss with Dimitri at all.

“Are you ill, Your Highness?” Dedue said, with no intentions of being discreet with his volume management. “You have not touched your food.”

Everyone paused their conversations to stare at the king, who had been staring at his plate until Dedue had spoken up to him. He looked up at the sudden silence, surprised to see everyone’s eyes on him. He gave Dedue a small smile, assuring him that he was alright, which Dedue reluctantly accepted, but it was not good enough for Ingrid.

“You don’t look very well, Dimitri,” she insisted, leaning forward a bit to get a better look at him. “Have you been sleeping alright?”

He looked over, meeting your eyes for a very brief moment before immediately looking at Ingrid, ignoring your confused stare. “I am fine,” he said reassuringly, shaking his head with a laugh when Ingrid gave him a hard look. “Really, Ingrid. I am alright.”

“If you don’t sleep, you’re just making it easier for the enemy to cut you down,” Felix said sharply.

“I bought some tea at the market that is supposed to help with sleeping problems if you would like to try some,” Mercedes offered.

“I promise you all that I am alright,” Dimitri insisted with a smile.

Sensing that a change of mood was in order, you offered the last remaining thing on your plate, a Dagda fruit muffin, to Sylvain. You found that you did not like Dadga fruit tea, and so you figured that it would be better to give it to someone who would appreciate it more. And it didn’t hurt as a conversation swap either.

“You don’t want it, Professor?” he asked, blinking at you, surprised.

You shook your head, holding the plate a little closer to him, and he shrugged, grinning at you. “Who am I to refuse you? Thanks for the muffin.”

Sylvain ate the muffin in a few bites as Dimitri finally began to pick at his own tray. You tried again to catch his eye, but he was determined to stare down at his plate. Conversation began to pick up again as Annette started to tell a story from back when they were all students. The conversation took a nostalgic turn as everyone then began sharing stories from their school lives five years prior.

“Not to be rude, but I thought you hated us at first!” Annette told you, blushing slightly with embarrassment.

“I must confess that I felt the same at the start,” Ashe agreed, quickly adding, “but we couldn’t be where we are now without you.”

“I do remember calling you beautiful and you just stared at me... I thought you didn’t hear me for a second,” Sylvain recalled.

“How is that any different from now?” Felix sneered.

“That is true,” Mercedes agreed. “Just the other day I saw a village girl just turn around and leave without saying anything.”

“Mercedes!” Sylvain’s jaw went slack. “You saw that?”

“I see your success rate hasn’t changed,” Felix scoffed.

Sylvain really had no comeback for that, and you were far from the only one at the table to laugh at his plight. Giggling, you locked eyes with Annette, who you noticed had also finished her plate. Nodding at each other, you both got up from the table to take your empty plates back.

“I feel like I’ve got my muffin fix for a while!” she joked as you handed your empty plates to the dining hall staff.

“What are your plans for the day?” you asked her, and she smiled.

“Don’t tell Mercie, but she was talking about how she missed these sweet ginger cakes we had when we were younger, and I was going to make some to surprise her with!” she whispered excitedly.

You were glad that Annette was such an endless supply of joy and kindness. You knew how much everyone appreciated any distractions from the mounting scale of war you were faced with, and so you also would have to do your best to keep a happy demeanor about yourself. Annette’s eyes drifted from yours as you both got back to the table as she stared ahead.

“Hey, where did Dimitri go?” she asked.

You looked over to where Annette had her eyes set and noticed that your table was missing its blonde king. You both must have looked incredibly confused, because Dedue decided to put you out of your misery.

“His Highness… had something to attend to.” Even Dedue sounded puzzled.

“Yeah, he just said that he had forgotten to do something and left…” Ingrid added, her eyebrows drawn together.

“Maybe he just had a bad reaction to the muffins?” Sylvain suggested, but one look at Dimitri’s plate told you that he hadn’t eaten a single thing from his plate.

He was acting weird, but he didn’t seem to be sliding back into his darkness again. Even so, you would have to check on him later, just to make sure. You had abandoned him for five years, even if it wasn’t by choice, and you would never leave his side again until the day came when he no longer needed you. You wouldn’t lose him again, not when everyone, when Faerghus, needed him.

Dimitri walked briskly to the cathedral, taking up his usual spot in front of the rubble that had once been a proud altar. He knew that he was clearly acting off, and his friends would eventually come and make sure he was okay. And he knew that he was not doing well, but it was not the type of problem that he imagined that they thought that he was dealing with. He had never dealt with anything like this before, and he didn’t know what to do. And so, he stared at the rubble, but too lost in thoughts to take in the scenery.

He couldn’t sleep at all the night before, and he didn’t know how he would get any sleep tonight. Seeing your mostly nude body had awoken within him feelings that he had kept himself from feeling for so long. He had been so focused on revenge for the entirety of his developing years that he had never allowed himself to think of romance as more than a faraway concept. He had sheltered himself for so long, and now the reality of his situation was hitting him with the full force that it would have had he allowed himself when he was a teenager. Instead, he was an adult man who was only now realizing the depths that his feelings could reach. He loved you, and it scared him.

He knew that he couldn’t avoid you forever. You had a war to win, and he couldn’t avoid his closest ally, even if he happened to just discover his feelings for you. He wanted desperately to be near you, but even with your widening range of emotions, he had seen no indication that you had any romantic feelings towards him. And besides, you would never talk to him again if you found out that he had stayed in your room while you were not fully dressed, even if it was to help you recover from your fever. He would live with his shame and hide his feelings, and would channel his energy into the war. Although that still didn’t resolve how he was going to sleep tonight, since he knew that every time he closed his eyes that night he would see your perfect breasts or your kind smile.

He had spent the last few hours of the night after he had returned to his room staring out of his window into the night sky. He had wrestled with his longing to go back there and tell you how he felt, kiss you… but you were sick. You needed rest. And you certainly did not need to have to deal with this new revelation of his. He relied on you for so much that he would crumble without your support, and so he just had to accept that your support would never be that of a wife’s to him.

He felt like a preteen boy. He couldn’t even stand to meet eyes with you in the dining hall earlier. He was so focused on staring at his plate that he could barely hear what anyone else had said. He had met your eyes for only half a second and even that was too much for him in his current state. You had looked worried for him, worries that he didn’t feel that he could assuage. He would have to keep his distance from you until he could resolve this within himself.

He must have been lost in thought for a while because eventually, he realized that Dedue was by his side. He gave Dedue a nod and then turned back to face the rubble, but a call of his title had him looking back to his stoic friend.

“Is everything alright, Your Highness?” Dedue asked simply.

“I…” Dimitri was not sure what to say.

“When I pledged myself to you, I intended to ensure that no harm came to you,” Dedue explained. “If anyone has been upsetting you, or you are suffering a cursed ailment, you need only to tell me and I will scourge whoever dared to curse you.”

Dimitri could never have a normal conversation with him during this war, could he? There were so many threats to his life, he was willing to admit, but Dedue never ceased to worry, even when everything was stable for the moment. He knew that Dedue cared about him, but he always thought the worst of things when it concerned his king.

“I have no injuries or curses, my friend,” he told Dedue who looked entirely unconvinced.

“If it is something that you feel that you cannot tell the others…” Dedue’s offer was implied. He was concerned, that much Dimitri could tell easily.

“For now, it is something that I must handle on my own,” Dimitri said, not meeting his friend’s eyes.

It took some convincing, but Dedue finally relented in his insistence that he walk the king back to his room, despite the fact that they were on entirely different floors. He also rebuffed Dedue’s offer to stand guard outside his room the entire night to defend him from attackers. Dedue had finally, reluctantly relented and allowed Dimitri to finally return to his room alone. He was careful to check that he hadn’t been followed; Dedue had done it before, after all. But he saw no signs of anyone following him and arrived on the second floor of the dormitories, not meeting anyone on the way down the hall and to his room.

It was early in the night, he discovered as he returned to his room. It was earlier than he usually went to sleep, but being awake for closing in on thirty or so hours was wearing on him. With getting some rest potentially in sight, he sat on his bed and began the painstaking process of removing his armor. He let out a tired sigh as his leg armor came off, and he carefully placed it aside before repeating the process on his upper armor, removing his cape and furs as well when he had taken his armor off. He was left in just his long black undershirt and black pants, which was all he wore when he slept these days. Although he did recall that he had previously pushed himself to the point of collapse when in his full armor before, and waking up from that had never felt pleasant on his body. But given his state of mind at the time, he simply got up and continued to do the work he felt needed to be done; being sore never kept him from the slaughter. But as he was now, he appreciated that he could take his armor off at the end of the day and rest. He never knew how nice it would feel to let down his last layer of defense and truly be himself around his friends with nothing to hide. Well, he thought, nothing to hide but his attraction to you that refused to wane.

He would try to sleep; at least now he was in his room, where he was not likely to run into you. His onset affection for you was so strong that he didn’t think it would go away, and he did not know if that was a good thing or not. He took off his shoes, setting them down before laying down on his bed and closing his eyes in the hope that sleep would find him.

You had spent your day talking to the other occupants of the monastery, doing your best to confirm that everyone was doing alright. You knew that this war weighed on everyone’s souls, and if you could do anything to help, you would. And so, you did some light training with Felix, went to the marketplace with Ashe, and ended up helping Annette do some baking for Mercedes, which did not result in any kitchen disasters for once, which was a relief. You had seen Dimitri in the cathedral earlier, in that same place he had always gone before he had broken free of his darkness. You decided to give him some space, but when you passed by the cathedral again later in the evening, he was no longer in his usual spot in front of the rubble.

Whatever was wrong with him, you wanted to give him time. You really did. But if he was sinking back into his inner darkness, then you couldn’t stand by and let it happen again. You walked around the monastery grounds but were unable to find him. As a last ditch effort, you decided to head to the second floor of the dormitories to check and see if he was in his room. You passed various people as they headed to their own rooms to retire for the night, smiling as Flayn excitedly wished you a good night as you passed by her. Finally, you arrived at what you recalled to be Dimitri’s bedroom door.

You raised a hand and lightly knocked on the door. No answer. Maybe he had gone for a late night walk and you had just missed him on your walk around the monastery. You knocked one more time, slightly louder, but still got no response. You couldn’t hear any sounds from at all from the other side of the door. Having no choice, you reluctantly decided to leave and head back to your own room. You could talk with Dimitri the next time you saw him, you reassured yourself. And so, you began to retreat the way that you had come, off to get some sleep and hopefully wake up fully free from your sickness.

“Professor…”

It was so quiet that you almost didn’t detect it, but you supposed your sensitivity on the battlefield allowed you to pick up the muted whisper of your old title. You turned your head back, not sure what to expect, but found Dimitri in only pants and a long-sleeved shirt, both in black, staring at you from just outside his room. He met your gaze with a look of surprise on his face, almost as if he had not expected you to hear him or turn back to look. You made your way back over to him, and he opened his door wider and gestured for you to accompany him inside.

He walked all the way to his window before turning only his head back to face you. His expression was unreadable, but yours certainly wasn’t, and he immediately saw the worry on your face.

“Are you okay?” you asked quietly. You knew that you couldn’t make him talk if he didn’t want to but you needed him to know that you were here for him.

“You never let up, do you?” he asked, and you vaguely recalled him saying something like that to you in the past. Before you could reply, he continued. “I could not be who I am today without your help.”

Why was he saying that now, and then why did he look so troubled? You didn’t understand where he was going with this, and were about to tell him so.

“I could not stand to lose you,” he spoke slowly, finally turning around fully and stepping slightly closer to you. “But I fear that I may if I tell you what is on my mind.”

“That is not possible,” you countered, staring him down sternly.

Dimitri only grew a small sad smile at your words. He looked to be waging a mental war on himself, but you bridged the gap that was still between you and forced him to look at you in the eyes. You looked at him with all the seriousness you could manage in an attempt to convey to him that you would listen to anything that he had to say. He broke eye contact with you almost immediately, staring at the floor as he spoke quietly.

“You had a fever,” he explained. “Nobody had seen you the day after you were out in the rain. I went to check on you, and you were not answering your door and I…”

Your eyes went wide in surprise. That night, you were…

“I am so sorry, Professor!” he spoke, sounding upset as he hung his head in shame. “I saw you in a state that only your husband should see you in and I-”

His rambling cut off and you looked at him, trying desperately to have him meet your eyes, but he continued to look at the floor, so you took a second to reevaluate these new revelations. Dimitri had not fully explained, but from what you had pieced together, he had been worried about you and came into your room, which must have been after you had stripped down to only your underwear, based on Dimitri’s odd husband comment. You felt a rush of embarrassment that he had seen you like that, but you found that you were more bothered that he had seen you looking so weak rather than the fact that he had seen you nearly naked. But you also found that you didn’t really mind that it was him that had seen you that way.

“I… I did not leave you be. I could not. I stayed with you and kept a cold cloth on your forehead until your fever broke. I should have left, but I could not just leave you like that,” Dimitri spoke up again.

He was so earnest that it was cute. Apologizing for seeing you nearly nude was one thing, but you stifled a laugh as he was for some reason apologizing for staying with you and taking care of you while you were sick. He was fiercely intelligent, brave in the face of the hardships of war, but looking at him now, he looked like an awkward teenager trapped in the body of a grown man. You could no longer help yourself, and you let out a quiet giggle.

“Professor?” Dimitri uttered as he looked at you in shock and you laughed at his expression.

“You’re so cute,” you told him, and watched as your words sent a pink flush to his cheeks as he stared at you in disbelief.

You knew that you should do something to put him out of his misery, but you weren’t sure what. You reached a hand up to cup one of his cheeks, and he looked at you unsteadily, closing his eye as he leaned into your touch. You weren’t sure why you had decided to reach out for him physically, but staring at his handsome face, so close to your own, you felt the most comfortable and safe you had ever felt. You closed your eyes too to bask in the moment, but then he said your name, not your title, but your actual name. You opened your eyes again and the two of you stared at each other and he raised his own hand to cover yours that was still on his cheek. He had an urgency in his eyes that you could not place.

“I need to kiss you,” he said, not breaking eye contact, unwavering under your surprised look.

You really shouldn’t have been as surprised as you were, given how physically close the two of you were now, and how emotionally close you had been to each other for so long, but you hadn’t had the time to think that this was even a possibility. Overpowering all of your mind was the sense that this was all that you wanted in this moment. He was different than he had been when you had reunited with him, but he had broken free of his darkness, and had become the kind, strong leader that his people needed. That you all needed. He was your dearest friend, but right now you wanted him to kiss you more than anything, and so you nodded.

He didn’t waste any more than a few seconds before bending down and connecting your lips as your eyes slid closed as the same time. You adjusted your chin so you would be better locked together as your other hand weakly grasped at the material of his shirt, just above his chest. The kiss felt so effortless, as you both adjusted to the other’s rhythm and Dimitri’s other hand came up to rest on the back of your head, keeping you close together.

The kiss stayed simple, but it was making you feel lightheaded with the intensity that you were both putting into it. You pulled away, not confident in your ability to breathe at the moment and he followed, gently steering you back until the back of your knees hit his bed and you allowed him to push you back down onto it.

You found yourself laying on your back as Dimitri hovered over you, his legs on either side of you. He was upright with his knees pressed against your upper thighs, looking at you with want but unsure of how to proceed. While he sat there in a daze, you shrugged your coat off and gently removed your gauntlets, letting it all fall down in a heap by the bedside, and as you did, you noticed a pile of Dimitri’s own clothing and armor only a few feet away.

When you looked back up, you noticed that Dimitri had been following you with his gaze, but he still looked unsure. You had no idea what was going on in his head or what had happened to his confidence, but you decided that you would have to make it abundantly clear that you would like this to continue. And so, you lifted your torso up from the bed and wriggled out of your shirt, throwing everything that covered your upper body onto the floor and watching Dimitri’s eye widen and cheeks turned red as he once again took in the sight of your bare breasts. You were just happy that you were conscious this time so you could enjoy his very honest reaction.

He was still staring, this time he had switched back to look you in the eyes and you couldn’t help but tease him. “Dimitri, your shirt…”

He finally relaxed a bit and smiled so sweetly down at you. “I suppose I should make it even.”

You had never seen him shirtless before, but the scars on his body told you what he could never bring himself to about what had happened to him over the past ten years. He gave you no explanation, and did not give you the time to fully examine all of his scars as he lowered his head down and kissed you again, feeding in your boldness as he supported himself with one hand, bringing his other hand up to feel one breast. The shock of his sudden movements had you moaning in surprise, and the kiss transitioned further as you both allowed your tongues to meet as well.

You cradled his head in your hands, bringing one hand through his hair, so much longer than it had been five years earlier. Finding yourself wanting to be even closer to him, you brought one leg out from under him and wrapped it around his hip. The position allowed you to grind up against him, and he met your hips excitedly as you kissed and you felt a shiver go down your spine as you realized how much he wanted this, your hips so close together that you could not miss how hard he had become in such little time. The friction was exactly where you wanted it, but it began to not feel like anywhere close to enough.

He pulled back from you by a few centimeters, nose still touching yours, and his hand that was not supporting his weight drifted from your breast to brush a hand through your hair. “I love you,” he said sincerely, chuckling as you looked up at him in shock. “You did not think I loved you?”

He seemed amused by your lack of response, and in truth you did not know, you had been so happy to be like this with him that you hadn’t even considered the feelings that were obviously involved. But you could not deny how happy those words made you, and he leaned down to kiss you again as a smile lit up your face. He gave you a few short kisses before he disengaged himself from you, sitting at the side of the bed, and you hastened to join him. He looked over as you hesitantly placed your head on his shoulder, and he readily accepted the contact.

“I did not think that I would ever feel like this… that I deserved to feel this way with you. I escaped the darkness that I had been trapped in, but I know there are those who will never forgive me for the sins I have committed. But you stuck by my side when I treated you so poorly. I don’t deserve you… any of you,” he said, staring at the wall but wrapping an arm around your naked back.

“You are indispensable to me,” he said as he leaned over to kiss your hair. “I knew that I would not be here without you, but I did not realize my feelings until that night.”

You knew which night he meant, but you had taken even longer than him to discover your own feelings, but you knew now. You loved him, and there was no going back now, even if you wanted to. Which, sitting side by side in this moment, you knew that you only wanted to experience even more with this man who was so dear to you.

“I wanted to wait until after the war, until we had peace. But after that night, I could not look back at you without seeing your bare form. It is shameful, but I cannot hold back any longer, especially now that I know it is mutual,” he explained, adjusting the both of you so that you were facing each other. “I want to be with you.”

He was looking at you expectantly, but kindly. You realized that he needed you to also affirm that this was real, that you loved him as well. He believed in you, but you knew that you should put the poor boy out of his misery. You leaned in to kiss him and he reciprocated happily, pulling back after a few seconds, eyes fluttering open to look at Dimitri, who looked so content in that moment.

“I love you,” you told him, truly meaning it. “I want to be with you.”

Dimitri looked so happy, but with a glance downwards, you saw that he was no less hard. It looked rather painful, and couldn’t be comfortable for him. You were not as subtle as you thought you had been, and he caught your glance downwards on his form.

“I… it is okay, I would never pressure you. You do not have to worry about me,” he said quickly, face flushing pink.

He was about to get up and put some distance between you, but you would not let that happen. You stood up with him and spoke his name softly as you slipped your hands into the sides of your shorts, pulling them down along with your tights and slipping out of them and your boots. It was not a particularly graceful or sexy stripping of your last articles of clothing, but it got the job done. You crossed the room to where he was standing and he allowed you to begin the process of removing the clothes covering his lower half.

“If this is what you really want,” his growled words sent your cheeks aflame. “I will not hold back, my love.”

He helped you by kicking his pants and underwear off, and as soon as you were both fully naked, he picked you up, his hands grasping your thighs to support you. You hastily wrapped your legs and arms around him so you wouldn’t fall, and he grinned at you as he placed you down on the bed, following you down so he could kiss you again. Dimitri kissed you for only a moment longer as you desperately tried to keep up with his pace. You were so ready for what was to come, and you pulled back from the kiss and gazed up at him with longing.

Dimitri swallowed as he looked down at you, and you spread your legs as he reached down to his achingly hard cock. You were embarrassed to discover that you were easily wet enough from just kisses and simple groping that Dimitri was able to rub himself against you before he began to slide himself inside with ease. You let out a breathy moan as you tried not to squirm at the foreign feeling. Dimitri’s eyes closed as he dropped down to rest his head on your shoulder, his deep groan right by your ear as he pushed further inside you. Finally, your hips fully met as he was seated fully within you, and you knew that you had never felt anything like this before. You knew what sex was, your father had been too awkward to give you the talk himself and had a female village chief explain to it to you after you had saved their village, so you knew the basics. But no explanation could match up with how good it felt to be so intimate with the man you loved.

You felt his breath tickle your ear as he pulled himself back up, his eyes half lidded. “You feel so good… forgive me, but it is hard for me to focus on anything else.”

You felt the same way, but you didn’t have the patience for him to wait and adjust to this feeling, so you decided to force the issue by squeezing your inner muscles and watching as he shuddered, eye fluttering closed for a moment with a groan. He opened his eye to glare halfheartedly at you, obviously too pleased at the moment for you to believe that he was actually angry with you.

“You are so impatient,” he teased, but complied with your wishes as he pulled ever so slightly out of you before canting his hips back into yours.

He didn’t waste a second in continuing the movement, and his gentle rocking was driving you crazy. You were completely naked, and it had been a cold month, but you were so, so warm. There was a pleasant burn that was slowly ebbing away to just feel good in a way that you had never felt before. Evidently this was new to Dimitri as well, because he was in no better of a state than you were, panting against your skin as he leaned down to kiss at your neck. You were content to lay like that, your arms around his neck and feeling his hair tickle your face, but a well-timed thrust had you unexpectedly crying out with the sudden spike of pleasure.

Dimitri couldn’t suppress his own groan as he was able to reach deeper within you. And when you rolled your hips up to meet him, he almost stopped his momentum to bask in how good it felt. He once again palmed your breasts and stifled your moan as he kissed you again. He closed his eye as he kissed you because he feared that if he was to keep it open and take in the way you looked right now, this would end far sooner than he wanted. You were so beautiful like this, and his heart stuttered with every sound that left your mouth.

He wanted this to last, but he could no longer be satisfied with the current pace. He began to pull out more swiftly and push back in with a new speed and intensity. He felt pride surge up in him as you squirmed and broke the kiss to let out another cute cry. Your next cry was of his name, which set his pace on fire as you both rapidly tried to meet your ends as you both connected in a desperate clashing of tongues, both groping at any inch of the other’s skin that you could reach.

“I fear this will not last much longer, beloved,” Dimitri panted. “But we have so much more time ahead of us.”

You weren’t fully sure what he meant by that, but at this point you were so close to reaching your peak that you could do no more than moan and grasp weakly onto his neck and back, tangling one hand in his hair. You closed your eyes tightly as Dimitri held you as close to him as he could, his chest brushing against yours in tandem with his thrusting. It only took a bit more of his harsh, fast pace before you lost yourself in pleasure. Dimitri continued to move, prolonging your orgasm as you moaned and squeezed around him. He could only hold out for so long and he was finally pushed over the edge with a strained groan of your name. The two of you stayed joined for a moment before Dimitri gently moved off of you, giving you a shy smile. You went to get up with him, but he stopped you with a hand on your arm and you obeyed, laying back down, but looked at him quizzically.

“You may not want to get up. We have made quite a mess,” Dimitri said reluctantly.

He wasn’t making eye contact anymore, and you followed his gaze downwards on your body. Oh. Without the feeling to distract you, you realized just how gross you were feeling… down there. You closed your legs tightly in embarrassment, and in the hopes that you wouldn’t ruin Dimitri’s sheets. Feeling an onset of bashfulness, you also brought an arm up to cover as much of your chest as you could; despite what you had just done with him, the reality of the situation was catching up to you.

Dimitri laughed at your sudden shyness. “I will go fetch something to clean you up with,” he explained, beginning to dress himself to his first layer of clothing, foregoing his armor.

He bent down to kiss one of your flushed cheeks, and then he was gone out the door. Once the door had been closed and you were alone, you felt all of your remaining composure slip away. You and Dimitri had… you had no idea how he was so much more composed than you were, easily leaving the room to bring back something to clean you up. You felt too embarrassed to leave this room for a month, let alone right after you had been so intimate for the first time. You did not even know what to say to Dimitri when he got back, but you would dare to hope he had meant what he said, implying that he wanted to do this again. That he loved you. But for now, all you could do was wait for him to return.

Dimitri kept a relatively quick pace to fetch a cloth, although for a much different reason than the previous time. He still had a hard time believing that had just happened, that you and he were… he loved you, and he would not deny it even if being open about it was so new for him. Smiling to himself, he wistfully hoped that you would agree to spend the night in his room. He would not force you, but he could not deny that the idea of waking up and seeing your beautiful face first thing in the morning set his heart aflutter.

Dimitri had gotten to the middle of the hallway before he noticed someone waving at him just past his room, standing at the end of the hallway. Sylvain grinned at him as Dimitri walked past his own room to meet his friend just outside the redhead’s room.

“Late night walk, Your Highness?” Sylvain quipped, eyes briefly darting down to the towel in Dimitri’s grasp.

Dimitri was silent for a moment too long, wondering what to respond, and Sylvain laughed awkwardly, running a hand through his hair. “Just one thing though, you might want to noise-proof your room.”

“Sylvain!” Dimitri admonished, shocked.

“Hey!” Sylvain waved his hands in a defensive manner. “It wasn’t me! But, uh, Felix was just here complaining that you and the Professor were interrupting his sleep…”

Dimitri was not sure what to say to that, and immediately felt bad because he was sure that you would be embarrassed if you knew that you two had been heard. Dimitri turned a hard gaze to Sylvain; his childhood friend had not been known to be the most trustworthy with gossip, but Sylvain immediately knew what Dimitri was thinking, and what he was likely about to say.

“I wasn’t going to tell anyone, relax!” Sylvain stated quickly. “Just be careful, ladies don’t really like having an audience.”

Dimitri scoffed, but smiled at his friend. “I will keep that in mind, Sylvain.”

Relieved that Dimitri was not mad at him, he clasped one of his friend’s shoulders. “I won’t keep you from her, but I just wanted to say that I’m happy for you. You deserve to be happy, Dimitri. Just don’t let her get away!” he joked.

Both men having said their piece, turned to go to their respective rooms. Dimitri could only hope that you hadn’t heard any of their conversation. The last thing he wanted to do was scare you away or make you uncomfortable. But as he opened the door, he found you still on his bed, shutting the door behind him without looking back because he could not stand to look away from the smile you gave him upon seeing him return.

It hadn’t been long, but you felt happiness surge up in you at the sight of him. He briskly made his way over to you and handed you the towel he had brought, to your great relief. It would be too embarrassing to have him clean you, and so you accepted the towel gratefully, cleaning yourself as he turned his back to give you some privacy. You made quick work of cleaning yourself, feeling less of a mess immediately, other than your hair still being slightly matted to your forehead with sweat. You wanted to savor this moment, but you also wanted to know if he had really meant what he had said earlier.

Dimitri, not noticing the shift in your mood, leaned down onto the bed just as you sat up so he could give you a light kiss. He looked so happy when he pulled away from you, his smile unwavering. It was only then that he noticed how strained your small smile was. “My love…?”

“…you said we would have more time,” you said quietly, and his brows drew together in confusion, before nodding affirmatively.

“You have not figured it out yet?” Dimitri teased, reaching down to hold your hand. “I would hope that this was not the only time we would be together like this.”

You were still confused, and he noticed immediately. “I do not mean only in a carnal sense. This is a rather unusual setting, but I have no regrets. I want to marry you.”

Oh... You stared at him in shock. You weren’t sure what you were expecting him to say, only just nervous that he would tell you to leave, that this was a one-time thing. But he had gone in the farthest direction possible from what you had feared. You found that you really wanted this, you wanted to marry him, wanted to stay by his side forever. None of your thoughts made it to your face, your expression blank as you stared at him. Dimitri didn’t seem to understand what you were thinking, and got a little anxious himself.

“If you do not want to, of course…” he muttered. “I do not have a ring, yet I decided to ask this of you. I understand if you do not want this with me.”

He had seemingly already decided his fate, and you smiled softly at him. “I accept.”

“You… you do?” he sounded surprised, and you weren’t quite sure why. He was a wonderful man, and you loved him so much. He was a fool to think anything otherwise. Especially after what you had just done together, and all you both had been through.

He had finally seemed to get the message, and practically lunged towards you, connecting your lips together in a rough kiss. This war would end, you knew, and then the two of you could build a peaceful world together. You looked forward to that, but you knew that you would have Dimitri at your side for anything that came your way, and that gave you all the confidence you could ever need.

[sipping-ambrosia-wine]

#she DIED when she was twelve and DIDNT COME BACK are you kidding me #theyre orphaned and theyre all each other have and bianca has been watching over him this whole time #70 YEARS in a brainwashing serotonin paradise casino DESIGNED to make you forget everything and everyone you love #and even through the time haze she NEVER LOST HIM she STUCK WITH HIM TOOK CARE OF HIM #WAS HIS BIG SISTER THE WHOLE TIME

#and then theyre at camp and there are suddenly people who really DO seem to care and he's safe here isnt he? #he's ten now thats old enough to start growing up a bit right? #the hunters are cool and they LIKE her and she wants to be like them and she CAN! they want her to join them! #and rejecting the company of men is a dating thing just because she branches out doesnt mean she doesnt care or isnt his sister anymore #and sometimes growing apart is a natural part of growing up. #AND THEN SHE DOESNT. LITTLE TWELVE YEAR OLD DEAD GIRL DOESNT COME BACK.

#and then nico is the son of hades and he can be with her again! but again and again he tries to bring her back or go with her #again and again he's told that he cant#again and again he's told that the dead must stay dead and elysium is FOR the dead no matter who his father is #HE LEARNS THIS LESSON OVER AND OVER AND STILL WHEN THE DOORS OF DEATH ARE OPEN HE SEES A CHANCE TO BRING HER BACK

#HE SEEKS HER OUT BUT SHES ALREADY GONE SHE REINCARNATED SHE IS ALWAYS LEAVING OUTGROWING HIM #its not her fault that she exists outside of being his older sister and yet he never gets over her leaving he never stops mourning #the codependency deep down he never outgrows the shy little kid hiding behind his big sister #jason and dick are NOTHING next to the di Angelos

#if you read this essay its a LEGAL OBLIGATION to vote di angelos #"oh so and so died and came back wrong" you think that makes tragic siblings. #how about ths nature of growth and how it makes strangers of us all. how about SHARED TRAUMA #and the parallel isolation of the path to recovery and self actualization. anchor and chain ball and tether #i am GNAWING on the bars of my cage the betrayal of growing up without me the guilt of being the first to heal #HE BECOMES OLDER THAN SHE EVER GOT TO BE AND YET HE IS ALWAYS THE CHILD

#she technically falls under fridging but the goddamn stars aligned with these two riordan didnt even do ANY of this on purpose #yet its all entirely textual theyre just LIKE that #older siblings were their own people before that younger siblings will never know any other way to be.

(copied my tags thesis from the poll post and edited for clarity. @op sorry for being annoying 😔)

Not me making propaganda for Nico and Bianca-

But like listen, Nico and Bianca were pretty much together during the lotus hotel and everything. When they finally got out, they were in a whole new world of modernization and they only had each other. They went to camp and Bianca was offered to become a Hunter and she immediately accepted, leaving Nico alone.

Bianca went on a quest and Nico made Percy promise to keep her alive which... Didn't happen. She died trying to get something for Nico to make him happy.

AND THEN Nico kinda goes evil? And tries to get her back and goes into the labyrinth with an evil ghost and low-key gets brainwashed? He keeps trying to contact her soul and fails every time until Percy comes in and tells him that maybe she doesn't want to talk to him. And then they contact her together and Bianca is like yeah I want you to move on. And leaves

FURTHER ALONG THE SERIES When the dead starts coming back to life because of the Doors of Death, Nico goes in trying to find Bianca and bring her back but TURNS OUT she chose rebirth. Meaning: she didn't even wait for him.

Idk fam that sounds pretty tragic to me

@tragicsibsshowdown

[pleasantanathema]

Graves into Gardens | Reiner Braun x Reader | Chapter Two

Chapter Two: Sins of the Past

Pairing: Reiner Braun x Fem!Reader

Rating: Explicit (18+ only)

Warnings: Modern AU, spoilers up to season four, slight manga spoilers (only by including characters met later), captivity, mentions of violence, mentions of character death, enemies to lovers, angst, and eventual smut (don’t worry, it’ll come sooner than you think).

Word Count: 2.8k

A/N: As promised, here’s chapter two! Chapter three will take a little longer to come your way as I have a final thesis due in a few days. Also, I promise that I’ll give answers to things that have happened in the past between Reiner and reader. Just gotta wait for the right time to reveal it all. 💕

Previous Chapter | Masterlist | Next Chapter

          Reiner laid flat on his back, chest twisting with melancholy as he eyed the lazy ceiling fan. He couldn’t sleep even if he tried, not with the day’s events still so fresh in his mind. Everything happened too quickly, a whirling rush of movements and decisions that left him caught in a purgatory of past and present. When Zeke had kicked your head into the floor, Reiner instinctively put pressure on the trigger of the gun squeezed too tightly in his hand. He wondered if things would be easier if he had taken the situation into his own hands and not let you live to torment him another day.

           Though, he knew the ghost and the guilt would haunt him even more than your living presence.

           That saying was rolling around in his brain, the one his mother always used to recite whenever he’d get into mischief as a child, be sure your sins will find you out.

           Well, they had, and one of his biggest regrets was now asking him about fucking Marco Bott. How long had it been since he heard that name? The Scouts had stopped muttering it even before the boy’s blood ran cold. He still remembered the smell of gun smoke, remembered how Bertie had fallen into his chest and cried at the horror of it all.

           But there was nothing new to be said about that past, yet even still, Reiner feared that you already knew what had been left unsaid.

           He hadn’t even bothered to undress, just let his weight sink into his mattress until his restlessness got the better of him. He knew his agonies would call to be smothered, that his frustrations would lead to him marching down the same hallway to face the inquiries of an equally troubled mind.

           He debated going to Zeke first. He knew his comrades would still be up in the meeting room, sleep and disgust in their eyes. Last he checked in, the Chief had Bertie scribbling on the whiteboard as he threw out all the notions and ideas that they had on how to break you down, on what you could possibly know that would be of interest to them. Reiner hadn’t stayed long enough to watch the black ink dry—he didn’t want them to pry into his time with you. He’d told them just enough: you didn’t give him anything worthwhile other than admitting you might speak if you were fed information from their side as well. When he’d left, the last thing written out in bold letters was a list of lies to feed you.

           Reiner was going to end this shit. One way or another, you were going to disappear from his life again; he was going to throw you back into the sea of the past where you belonged, dead or alive.

           A sick pride boiled inside of him as he saw the shock and fear spread across your pretty face as he threw open the heavy metal door. Good, you should be scared of him.

           He spoke your name with a bitterness he’d become too familiar with, dragging a chair from against the wall to sit directly in front of your iron cage.

           He’d only been gone a few hours, yet you already looked more tired, a little more frail, like if he screamed too loudly you might melt into a puddle where you sat on the floor.

           Too much time alone with nasty thoughts can make you weak, that much he knew all too well.

           He cleared his throat, cracking his knuckles beneath his fist, “Listen to me. You talk now, and maybe I’ll be merciful and kill you quickly before the others get the chance to come pick at your bones.”

           “You know my stipulation, Braun,” he watched your eyes narrow, determination coating your voice, “answer my question and I’ll answer yours. Let me die knowing the truth about—”

           “There is no truth about Marco.”

           “I know you had something to do with it. I kept finding holes in your story, and now that I know who you really are, I have no doubt that there’s something you aren’t telling me.”

           An angry sigh rushed out of his nose. He didn’t know what he was thinking coming back here so soon, why did he ever suspect that you’d ease up on this issue? He should’ve known that all your disdain for him began when that idiot got himself killed.

           “Marco was cute and clumsy, you know that. He was in the wrong place at the wrong—”

           “No, he wasn’t!” you sat up on your knees, shackled hands shaking, “I trained that kid myself. I know he knew how to use his gear; I know he wouldn’t just…he couldn’t have gotten into that situation alone.”

           “You’re running out of time. Stop wasting your breath on something as useless as Marco Bott.”

           He could tell there were more words brewing in your mouth, but you were swallowing them down.

           Reiner leaned his elbows on his knees, burdensome back hunching as he debated what to do here. He watched you closely for a moment, saw how you were constantly shifting your weight, fidgeting with the cuffs around your wrists. Bruises were blooming on your skin, especially around the tender flesh of your fingers where he had crushed them earlier. A vile mixture of remorse and compassion spread down his nerves at the sight of you.

           “My friends don’t know I’m here,” he admitted, observing how your still brilliant eyes looked up at him.

           “I was once your friend, you know.”

           You spoke the words so slowly, so dolefully that he actually felt them begin to pierce at his heart.

           “We were never friends.”

           That much, he knew, was a lie.

━━━─── • ───━━━

          “Reiner,” your tongue pressed against the back of your teeth as you stared into his golden eyes. He felt dangerous, fingers mean against your flesh, digging into your thigh, petting at the column of your throat.

           But you felt protected, secure, your hands threatening to tear at the buttons of his shirt from how tightly you clung to him. You craved a comfort that you’d come to find from being pressed against his body.

           “I’d kill someone for you, I hope you know that.”

           You wondered if the same memory was playing in his mind, behind his older, more noble face. You felt them, the sins of your past, like a heavy string binding the two of you together in this cold room. You knew there were feelings you could tug on, emotions that could have you both tumbling to the floor and wishing that the past could be washed away. But there were too many scars, too many faults that bound you together, wounds that time could not heal.

           And you knew your time was running thin.

           Selfishness reared its ugly head. You wanted to live, you needed to get back to Paradis, back into the arms of the people you loved. You didn’t want to die because of your stubbornness, or out of some forged loyalty that you knew friends would even give up if it meant being together one last time.

           “We know about the arms trading,” you conceded, head hanging low.

           You heard his chair scrape against the floor as he sat to attention.

           “How?”

           You thought about all the carefully considered words that you’d played in your mind earlier. You couldn’t give too much, but you had to lay enough on the table to make yourself valuable, to perhaps make yourself trustworthy. You needed to sprinkle lies into the truth, give a little in hopes of taking a lot.

           “Not everyone knows. It has been an investigative project I’ve been working on with Erwin and Miche…” you sucked in a deep breath, eyes closing, “we only figured it out because it came up as we were inquiring into the legitimacy of the President of Paradis. We’re pretty sure he’s a pawn, that there’s some untouchable group of aristocrats pulling his strings and ruling the nation from the shadows.”

           You waited patiently to see if he had any remarks, but the brooding man before you stayed silent. You could feel the weight of his gaze, scrutinizing, curious, perhaps disappointed that you’d be willing to give away secrets so easily.

           “That’s what you can give to Yeager. Tell him that…tell him that I’m tired of working and killing for a government that I can’t trust, whose true intentions I don’t know. Tell him I’m willing to work with him.”

           “And why would he be interested in that? You’re much more valuable as an information source than an agent.”

           You finally lifted your face to him then, a bold trepidation creeping over your skin.

           It was now or never.

           “Reiner, what I have to say next is something I’ve saved only for you. You can do with it what you will, but I beg of you, be careful with it. This could hurt you as much as it could hurt me in the long run.”

           Part of you expected him to leave again, to bristle at the thought of hearing something he doesn’t want to know.

           But he stayed, brows wrinkling together as he studied you before him. You felt like a beggar at his feet, spreading out all you carried in hopes that it was enough to appease the executioner before you.

           “Tell me,” he demanded, “though I make no promises to keep it silent.”

           You felt your courage implode. You almost wanted to gobble up your information and let it rest inside you forever to be gnawed at by your conscience.

           But if there were any fragments left of the man you once knew, of the Reiner Braun who had once held you so dearly, you knew that he would latch on to your words.

           “Zeke—your war chief—is working with Paradis. He’s plotting something so devious that even Erwin can’t pinpoint what it is, but we are certain he has contacts within the government that go beyond securing weapons for Marley.”

           You took a moment to pause, to let what you were saying sink into that thick skull of his.

           “Reiner, something seriously fucked up is going to happen if we don’t figure out what’s happening. And what’s happening is bigger than us—it’s bigger than all the shit we’ve been through. Help me, or it will be more than just me dying.”

You surveyed him as he straightened his broad shoulders, rolling them like a predator who was examining his prey. You’d just offered your life to him, held it out on willing hands with perhaps irresponsible words.

           You held in a sob as he left wordlessly, leaving his empty chair behind.

━━━─── • ───━━━

           Reiner sat with his arms crossed, trying to keep his face neutral as he watched Bertie haphazardly stretch his long arms across the board to erase of their previous work, writings of threaten Erwin, reveal the past of Paradis, and remove the bucket so she can’t piss all being wiped away from thought. He wondered, for a moment, if his friends were idiots, or just wasting time because they knew he’d wander back into her orbit sooner or later.

           He’d come straight to them, of course, straight to his trusted comrades and announced he’d managed to pry your lips open.

           Sans torture, he had stressed to Galliard.  

           But he had sat on the real information you gave him, letting your confessions about Zeke fester in his mind.

          Part of him wanted to believe you; he’d always been wary of his superior officer, always knew that his cunning and depravity could lead them all down a path of no return one day. But another part of him thought you were toying with him, trying to manipulate his doubts and sow seeds of skepticism into his mind. You’d always been so capable of getting whatever you wanted, always had a charm for subtle exploitation.

          “How can we believe any of this?” Annie berated, lighting a cigarette in the room despite knowing it was against Zeke’s rules.

          “Because we know she’s close to Erwin, close to the brass that runs the Scout Police Force,” Reiner countered.

          “More like she has always been up his ass, probably in his fucking bed too.”

           Reiner didn’t like the image that flashed in his mind, didn’t like the thoughts of the Commander running his hands across your skin, of you tangled in his sheets. He chided himself, worried it was a jolt of jealousy, but at this point, he could never distinguish his emotions anymore.

          “Annie,” Zeke hushed her, finally taking a seat at the rounded table instead of pacing a hole into the floor, “everything she has said adds up. I’ve kept our arms trading as quiet as I can, but if those little rats were going around interrogating congressmen, then it’s very possible one of them squealed on our operations just to keep their puppet president in power.”

          “So, it’s true then?” Bertholdt chimed in, shaking a marker within his aching fingers as he paused from taking notes, “that the government of Paradis is basically a sham.”

          “I’m afraid so.”

          And how do you know that? Reiner wanted to question, wanted to prod at the smug man who was waving cigarette smoke from his face.

          “So, what are we going to do with her?” Reiner finally addressed the elephant in the room, pulling at the last remaining thread to this horrible game they had gotten themselves into.

          “We’ll keep using her, of course. Though I don’t think she will give anything else up so freely. We need to give her some hope that we trust her, that she’s going to live through this little nightmarish web we’ve caught her in.”

          Reiner didn’t like the tone in Zeke’s voice. He seemed too relaxed, too humored by it all.

          It was at this time that Pieck wandered into the room, carefully balancing a crutch underneath her arm. She was carrying that soft smile of hers, leaning against the wall momentarily before also settling at the table.

          “A little birdy told me what all is going on,” she turned her grin to Galliard, whose chest puffed at his recognition, “Sorry I couldn’t make the last mission, Chief, the old leg just couldn’t handle it. But, I do have a suggestion to your little, hm, captive issue here.”

          The room felt tense, everyone focusing on the small woman as her prim cheerfulness refused to fade.

          “Let her free, under supervision, of course. Turn our old reconnaissance mission on its head; watch an outsider from inside our group, see if we can get her comfortable enough to open up again.”

          “Yes, exactly, Pieck!” Zeke let out a hearty laugh as he smacked the table with an open palm, wicked delight brightening over his features. He ran his fingers through his blonde ponytail, like he was settling into relief.

          Reiner felt his heart sink into his stomach, acid tearing at its flesh.

          “And it seems we have just the man for the job, seeing that he magically got the little vexation to open her mouth.”

          “No.”

          Reiner gritted his teeth, jaw flexing at the thought of being your god damn babysitter.

          “Oh yes,” Zeke fished around in his pocket then, pulling out a set of keys and sliding them across the table. Reiner didn’t move, just let the clinking metal fall into lap and sink into his thigh.

          “Go let her out of her cage, let her know we’ve agreed to take up her offer of help, but only if she follows orders and stays in your sight.”

          “Don’t you think a woman is more suited to this?” Annie chirped, carelessly smothering her cigarette out directly onto the table, hot ash settling into the grooves of oak.

          “You already passed on this task, sweetheart. Besides, it seems she might find Braun a little more tolerable after all.”

━━━─── • ───━━━

          And all this, all these words, all this fucking time passed, led to Reiner standing before you once again. His head rested against the rusted iron; grip so tight around the metal bars he worried he might actually bend them.

          He’d relayed the messages, but ensured you that this fucking Zeke business had stayed behind tight lips.

          When he opened his eyes, his vision focused on you, still sitting, an almost dumbfounded look on your tilted, tired head.

          “Thank you,” you whispered to him, a sincerity he wasn’t used to pooling in his ears, dripping down his skin.

          “Don’t thank me yet. There are still long nights ahead of you.”

          Ahead of him, he recognized.

          All he wanted was for you to disappear, to be washed away, but it seemed you were about to become a permanent stain on his life—a living, breathing body to remind him of the past he had left in the dark depths of his mind to rot.

          Be sure your sins will find you out, he mused, looking at a sin that might be too tempting not to partake of.

Next Chapter

[nothing-but-dreamy]

RECKLESS

Pairing: FFXV!NYX ULRIC x FEM!READER

Words: 2.559

Warnings: cursing, erotica

Synopsis: Yn is a reckless Glaive. One of her comrades is not okay with her behavior and so, he wants to talk with her.

"We need backup in the west! Behemoth and Imperials. More to come. Nyx, where are you?", Luche asked through the intercom.

"I'm on my way-", Nyx answered through the ear-piercing noise of the battlefield.

"Am already there, Luch!", Yn answered Luche's request through the channel.

"No! Yn, don't! There are too many enemies! Yn!”, Nyx tried to call Yn through the channel but he got no response, “God damnit!", he cursed frustrated.

"Go! I'll manage it here!", Libertus' shouted over the impact of another grenade. Nyx cursed and left his friend's side, knowing exactly what Yn was about to do.

As Nyx reached the position, he already met a bunch of comrades, helping each other to fall back to a safer spot behind some crumbled ruins, "Where's Yn?", he asked concerned as he couldn’t see the small woman. An explosion enclosed them in a cloud of sand. As an answer, someone pointed at a Behemoth in some distance.

The angry creature screamed violently and tried to reach the position of Nyx and the others as it saw the Glaives. Nyx got ready to fight, almost throwing his Kukri, as he watched how a person appeared on top of the Behemoth's head out of nowhere, encircled with magical aftermath.

Immediately, Nyx noticed the small frame as Yn's and watched worriedly how she jumped from the head, aiming for the ear of the roaring animal to land on it before she pushed herself from it to slam both her blades into the throat of the creature as deep as she could to kill it. As the animal fell lifeless to the ground, sliding a few metres through the dust, Yn jumped from it and landed elegantly in front of Nyx' feet with a grin, "Oh, hey, Ulric! Wanna join the fun?"

"Fun? You-", but Nyx got stopped as Yn pushed him out of the line of fire the Magiteks had started. They were rolling over the ground until Yn landed on top of him, straddling Nyx' lap, her hands on his chest, "Well...nice view, hero.”, she whispered seductively, “But I have to go. Was my pleasure to save your sexy ass tho.", she said grinning before she got up on her feet, fighting against the closing imperial troops.

Cursing with annoyance, Nyx jumped back on his feet and joined her in the fight. She still had the upper hand but he knew that could change quickly. The Magiteks were merci- and countless. Nyx jumped next to her side the second she decapitated a mechanical soldier who knelt to her feet. Her daggers were sparkling in the setting sun while she smirked, her face covered with blood and dust.

"Yn! Nyx! What's your status?", Luche asked serious. He already had gotten the information that both Glaives were fighting in the most dangerous area. Alone.

"We're at the west wing.", Yn answered while killing another rifleman, stemming her foot on his chest to pull out her blade, "We're fighting against Magiteks but they're coming in steady waves. Behemoth is down, tho.", she called out, jumping at the next two soldiers and killed them both at the same time with her blades digging deep into their throats.

Nyx did the same and landed next to Yn with his back against hers to cover each other, "Luche, what are the next orders? We can't hold the line here without backup.", he called out seriously while the next wave was already on their way.

"Okay, all Glaives fall back! I repeat, all Glaives: fall back and regroup!", Luche ordered.

Nyx moved to follow the orders but stopped as he noticed that Yn wasn't behind him. As he turned around, he saw her fighting against the next Magiteks. Even another Behemoth was on its way, straight aiming for her position.

Fascinated and amazed at the same time, Nyx watched how easily Yn wielded the blades in her hands. As if she was dancing, she flew over the battlefield, warping back and forth. Effortlessly and merciless, like an angel of death, Yn took out one enemy after the next.

A Magitek shuttle dropped new soldiers while Yn aimed for the Behemoth. She was already running to it. Once again, Nyx cursed about her blind recklessness and was about to follow her, but as a grenade exploded near Nyx, he warped aside to get save. As he looked around the little piece of wall he was hiding behind, he saw nothing else then dust, debris and dead bodies.

***

"Yn!", Nyx called out as he saw the small woman walking down the hallway of the headquarters, joking with Furia about something random. The konvoi had brought them back five minutes ago and now, everyone was looking forward to taking a shower, a drink or to get some sleep after this long, exhausting fight against Niflheim.

Yn turned around as she heard her name and saw Nyx closing up on her, "Yeah? Oh, hey...", she exhaled, rolling with her eyes about his stern expression with the frown chiseled into his features.

"What was that back on the field?", Nyx asked angrily.

"Could you be more precise? You mean as I have saved your ass? Or as I had this little dance with the Magiteks?", Yn asked with a smirk, crossing her arms over her chest.

"I mean the fight with the Behemoth? And the imperials? And the other Behemoth?", Nyx pointed out as the other comrades passed them, ignoring the two who were always fighting about something since Yn had joined the Kingsglaive.

"Oh, I see! You're mad because you fear I would try to snatch away your little title as a hero. Don't worry. I'm not eager to steal anything from you. You can keep your reputation.", she said with an arrogant grin and walked away.

Nyx groaned annoyedly before he ran after her. Quickly, he grabbed her wrist and pulled her into an abandoned room where he closed the door and pressed her against a wall, caging her with his arms.

"What are you doing, Ulric? Let me go!", Yn hissed angrily.

"No! Not until you told me what your plan is. Are you so eager to die? Do you wanna get killed?", Nyx hissed through gritted teeth. He had much respect for this young woman and her skill but she was a bit too reckless for his liking.

"Oh, you're so quick to judge others, huh? Can I remind you that you're not even better than I am? What I have heard about you is that you're the incarnation of recklessness, hero! So, what makes you think you have the right to question my decisions? I'm still alive and also everyone else around me! That's all that matters! Always!", Yn said and stared serious at the man in front of her.

"You play with your life as if it would be just a game!", Nyx said through his gritted teeth.

"Yes! I play with my life! And? No one cares what I do with my life anyway! No one cares if I'm alive or not!", she snarled.

"I care about your life, fuck damnit!", Nyx hissed aggressively and in the next moment, he crashed his lips on hers to silence her. For weeks, he had been hungry to taste her lips. She drove him crazy with simply everything: with her manners, with her thoughtless will to fight against everything, with her undeniable beauty... Nyx felt frustrated when it came to her and to silence her and her nonsense was everything he wanted. That and to kiss her breathless.

But Yn wasn't amused and even if she had to admit that Nyx tasted seductively like sweet danger and kissed addictively, she hated when someone tried to silence her. So, she pushed against Nyx' chest to shove him away from her before she slapped his cheek violently.

Nyx' head snapped to the side with a stinging pain and after the first shock and panting for air, he looked slowly back at Yn who stared at him with a hatred filled glance.

Yn looked straight into his blue, dark sparkling eyes, "Don't you ever fucking dare to silence me again! What I do with my life is not your concern. You care for me? Fine! But that won't change any of my decisions! Got it? And now", she growled, grabbing the collar of Nyx' uniform, "Kiss me again, idiot!", she ordered and pulled him back to connect their lips with a bruising force.

Nyx gave her no second chance to change her mind now, as he had her where he wanted to have her: in his arms. As he kissed her desperately, he pinned her with his lower body against the wall while he roamed appreciatively over her curves with his hands. From her chest down to her hips to her back and to her ass to squeeze it softly.

Yn enjoyed his admiring touch but she wanted more of him. She wanted to feel him under her hands like she had dreams about it when she was alone with her imagination. Quickly, she opened everything from his uniform jacket to push it down his shoulders. As the jacket fell to the ground, she undressed his vest and quickly, she also undressed his shirt to toss it away.

"Hell, are you done already?", Nyx hissed, annoyed as he had to leave her lips for the second time.

"Next time, you should consider to dress less of these irrelevant clothes. Just a tip.", she whispered husky with a smirk.

Nyx leant closer matching her smirk, brushing along her nose with his own, "Next time?"

"Depends on what you have to offer now, hero.", she whispered lasciviously against his lips and scratched down his back with her nails, which caused Nyx to moan with pleasure.

"You little minx. You're not even better than I am.", he breathed, pointing at the fact that she was still fully dressed.

Slowly, she opened her jacket to undress it. She undressed her vest under his observing glance and with her eyes still connected with Nyx' dark gleaming orbs, she undressed the shirt and the bra in one go. Yn noticed how his eyes flickered down her exposed chest. Slowly she opened her belt and then even her pants to let them fall down, stepping out of them, the underwear and the boots, "Now, tell me, what do you desire?", she breathed while shoving her hands over her head to display herself. With soft moves, she lolled underneath Nyx’ eyes, showing him what he could have if he just reached out.

Nyx gnawed on his lower lip as he enjoyed the view in front of him. Even after a battle, her skin seemed to be so soft. The countless, little scars were signs of her rough past and how persistent she had been so far. Her right rib cage was covered with brandings from the Magitek tortures she went through before she had come to Insomnia. Bruises were already building from the latest fights on the battlefield. And yet, she was breathtakingly beautiful, strong and determined to fight as long as she could.

Possessively, Nyx placed his hands on her hips, digging into her flesh which earned him low moans from her lips, "You wanna know what I want?", he whispered, "I want you, Yn. For a very long time, I'm just longing to have you.", Nyx breathed.

Yn smirked, "Then, make me yours, Glaive.", she breathed seductively, grabbing his belt to open it and then his pants to push them down his hips with an untamable, passionately, hungry fire.

Nyx didn't need another invitation. Quickly, he scooted her up with his hands underneath her ass, bringing her into position. Yn snaked her legs around his hips and pulled him even closer. The moment he entered her, he groaned deeply by the feeling of her wet walls enclosing him. Still adjusting, Nyx leant with his forehead against her shoulder, kissing her soft skin while she snaked her arms around his neck.

Yn rolled with her hips to increase the friction between them even more while she raked her fingers through his soft hair, tugging on his braids and strands to tease him. Never before, she had felt so wanted by someone like in this moment as Nyx showed her his affection through his lips and hands, "God damnit, Nyx.", she breathed, panting for air as she just concentrated on the hot feeling of the man inside of her.

As he heard his name falling from her lips, Nyx raised his head to look into her eyes. She looked straight into his eyes as he started to grind with his hips. He saw the pleasure in her features. Whenever he reached her pleasure point, Yn moaned with relish and closed her eyes while she just enjoyed what he did.

Amazed, Nyx grinned while he felt how her legs tightened around his hips, keeping him in place. As he noticed that she was close, he kept his moves steady to give her what she needed. Yn's breath became more erratic and before she could betray their hidden position with her scream, Nyx captured her lips with his so she was moaning into his mouth as she rode out her orgasm on him.

Nyx shuddered as Yn's nails dug into his shoulder blades. Her walls clenched around him and she bit down on his lip. While she tried to come down, Nyx rolled his hips into hers to satisfy his own desire.

Still breathless, Yn smirked as she saw his dark, lust-filled glance. He looked her in the eyes once again as if it would turn him on to see her reaction. Slowly, she tightened her walls around him again while she scratched along his neck and shoulders with her nails to push him over the edge with sweet pain.

To muffle the sound of his own climax, Nyx buried his face into the crook of her neck, biting into her soft skin under her ear which let her shudder against his solid body. As Nyx came slowly clear, he put Yn back on her feet while both were still panting for air. Softly, Yn cupped his face, cradling his stubbles, tracing the lines of his lips and jaw with her thumbs to worship his handsomeness.

Nyx leant against her forehead with his own, enjoying her softness towards him, "Please, stop being reckless.", he breathed against her lips, embracing her frame to pull her against his naked skin, not able to let her go just yet.

Yn felt touched. No one before was so eager to keep her alive or in their life at all, "Well, I can't promise you that, Nyx. But ... What do you think of the following idea: Come to my place later and show me your arguments again why I should be more cautious, huh?"

Nyx grinned, kissing her softly and caring before he looked her in the eyes again, "Trust me, I will be there."

"Like you, I trust more in actions than in words. So, convince me, hero.", she breathed with a smirk and a pat on his chest before she passed him to dress her clothes again. Yn left the room with the hope he would follow her request later so she would be less alone for the first time in her life.

[suttttton]

Growing Pains

Febuwhump Day 1: Mind Control

***

“You knew what you would find here, didn’t you?” Annabelle asks, leaning back against her kitchen counter, looking over Jon with eyes far too predatory for his liking.

“To be honest, I expected more spiders,” Jon says. He’s seated at Annabelle Cane’s table, in Annabelle Cane’s flat. Annabelle Cane is making him tea. He came here of his own accord, and even though he can feel his heart in his throat, he refuses to regret this decision. Hadn’t he long ago decided that answers were worth the fear? Isn’t that how he’s made every decision, since Jane Prentiss attacked the Archives? Since he read the wrong book and narrowly escaped being devoured by a monster?

Annabelle smiles, crosses her arms. “Just because you can’t see them doesn’t mean they aren’t here, Jon.”

Jon swallows. “Right.” His voice is faint.

“And yet you came anyway,” Annabelle says. “Do you know why?”

“I, uh… I thought I’d ask you—something. For a statement. Maybe.”

“And you thought I was likely to give you one?”

“Well, you invited me here, didn’t you?” Jon snaps, stiff politeness finally giving way to trembling anger.

“I did,” Annabelle says. She comes closer to Jon, and it’s all he can do not to flinch away from her. “Give me your hand,” she says, holding out her own to take it.

“Why?” Jon manages, even as he’s already extending his bandaged hand toward her.

She gives him a flat look, closes her eyes, takes a breath. His hand is trembling slightly, caged between her two hands. She opens her eyes. “Because our patron is worried about you,” she says. And then, her voice low with anger. “You will not compel me again.”

“Our patron?” Jon says.

Annabelle nods, her attention occupied examining the bandages on his hand. He tries to pull away, but he can’t. He can’t move his hand at all. She runs three fingers over the surface of his palm, and Jon holds back a squeak of pain at the gentle contact. “Jude did a wonderful job,” she murmurs, more to herself than to Jon. Then she looks at him, smiling. “And Martin did a wonderful job with the bandages.”

She releases him, and Jon jerks his hand back, cradling it to his chest. She steps even closer, and he’s frozen in place as one of her hands goes to his throat. Even over the bandages, she traces a line exactly where Daisy’s knife punctured his flesh. “Daisy’s is more impressive, though.”

The kettle screams, and she steps away to finish preparing the tea. Jon can suddenly move again, and he curls his arms around himself. This isn’t like meeting Jude Perry or Mike Crew. He wasn’t on even footing with them, either, but with Annabelle, it isn’t even close. He considers running, but he’s terrified that he’ll find himself unable to move if he tries to act on that thought.  

“Why am I here?” he asks. He’d grown used to the small sliver of power his questions gave him. It’s terrifying to lose that.

Annabelle sets a mug of tea in front of him. He picks it up, takes a sip. He didn’t decide to do that, but it’s happening anyway. She sits down across from him, takes a sip from her own mug. “The Mother of Puppets is fond of you,” she says. Like that explains anything.

“You mean, the—spiders?” Jon asks, dread growing in his stomach.

“Knock, knock,” Annabelle says, smiling at him over her mug.

A jolt of fear rushes through Jon, and he takes a deep breath, steadying himself. “But that isn’t—I belong to the Institute, the, the Eye.” Jon still has so many questions about the Entities, so many things that he doesn’t know, puzzle pieces that don’t quite fit together. But he knows that he doesn’t belong to the spiders. He escaped them. 

“Sure,” Annabelle says. “But the Web claimed you first. You’ve been running around, collecting your marks like a good little Archivist, all inspired by your desperate curiosity, your gnawing fear that you won’t be able to put all the pieces together in time. It’s all very Beholding-flavored.” She wrinkles her nose, and looks at Jon, still with that sly smile. “Much better for you to strengthen your connection to the Web. Your fear will feed us. You’ll have our gifts.”

“So this is, what, an invitation?”

“Sure,” Annabelle says. “If you want to think of it that way.” She pauses. “Of course, invitations presume that you can deny them, and free will isn’t exactly the Web’s strong suit. The Mother of Puppets wants you to be ours, so you will be.”

Jon opens his mouth, to ask what the hell that means, but Annabelle cuts him off. “You should probably be going now.”

Jon stands up, not of his own accord, and starts toward the door. Annabelle follows. Before he leaves, she plants a hand on his shoulder, and he just barely manages to not flinch away. “Jon,” she says, and there’s something different in her eyes now, replacing the sly teasing tone she’d taken before. She looks… concerned. Sad, even. “There will be some growing pains,” she says. “Just do what the Mother wants. It’ll be alright.” She squeezes his wrist, and then shuts the door.

He doesn’t decide to go back to the Archives. The Web decides for him.

***

“Good morning,” Martin says, bringing in tea, as he does every morning.

Jon smiles at him. “Good morning, Martin.”

Martin looks at him for long enough that Jon starts to frown. “Martin? Did you need something?”

“What?” Martin blinks. “No, sorry, I—You just look… really good. Better than you have since—Well, since you got back from your… vacation, I guess.”

“I suppose there’s no snappy way to say, ‘time when you weren’t coming into work because your boss framed you for murder and the cops wanted to kill you,’” Jon quips. “But yes. I feel better.” He lifts the statement on his desk. “Feels like we’re finally making progress towards something.”

“And your hand, and—It’s all healing well?” Martin asks.

Jon nods, flexing his hand slightly beneath the bandages. “I think I’m starting to get a bit of feeling back? Which is probably a good sign.”

“Probably,” Martin agrees. “I still think you should’ve gone to A&E.”

Jon nods, a little embarrassed. “Yes, well… if it gets worse, I’ll take your advice.”

“Alright,” Martin says. “Well, I’ll let you get back to it.” And then he leaves, smiling because, for the first time in recent memory, Jon actually seems as fine as he claims to be.

Jon wants to scream. He wants to curl up beneath his desk, arms wrapped around himself in some semblance of comfort. He wants to be held—Martin or Georgie or Tim, or someone. He wants the release of it, warm arms grounding him as he shakes apart entirely. He wants to beg the others to please, please help him.

Instead, he smiles at them when he sees them in the break room, when he asks them to look into certain details for him. He sits in his office, calmly reading statement after statement, finding as much information about the Unknowing as possible. He goes home and watches movies with Georgie, and laughs at all the right parts. None of it is his choice, and he is so, so scared. Scared of what the Web is planning. Scared that he will be nothing but a puppet for the rest of his life.

It’s strange, being so constantly terrified, but showing no physical symptoms of fear. His heart rate is normal. His hands and voice are steady.

It doesn’t escape his notice that they all like him better, like this. Unburdened by the weight he carries with him. He desperately wishes for one of them to notice that it’s wrong, that he’s wrong, but he knows they won’t. Even if they did notice, he isn’t certain they would want him to go back to what he was before.

It’s almost a relief when Breekon and Hope grab him. He chooses to fight them, kick out his legs uselessly as they tie him up and toss him in the back of their van. His heart is hammering, adrenaline firing. It’s exhilarating, but there’s no room to rejoice in his newfound freedom. He has to find a way out of this, but—

There is no way out. Nikola delights in reminding him of this, whenever she comes to see him. They tie him up in a dimly lit room, surrounded by horrifying mannequins that sometimes move. His binds are tight, as is the gag in his mouth, and though he can struggle against them, it’s clear he’ll never manage to wriggle out of them.

For a while, he expects someone to come rescue him. Maybe Annabelle, although if he really thinks about it, it’s more likely that the Web would simply manipulate someone else into coming. Maybe his assistants would come, if they can find him. (If they decide he’s worth rescuing.) He’s wanted by the Eye and the Web, and clearly that counts for something. Surely they wouldn’t just abandon him to be skinned alive by the Stranger.

But no one comes. It’s hard to keep track of time, but Jon knows it’s been a few weeks, at least. Long enough by far for a rescue party to come, if they ever planned on coming. He wonders if the Web is enjoying this, if this fear is Web-flavored enough for it. Maybe it set him up for this. Maybe it’s actively preventing him from escaping.

He’s allowed to cry now. He can even scream, if he wanted to, although the gag makes it kind of pointless. Nikola enjoys when he cries.

Michael comes, and then Helen replaces him, and Jon can see the spidercracks of the Web behind it. Helen opens her door to him, and even if he wanted to take his chances with the Stranger, the webs in his mind give him no choice but to accept her offer.

At least Helen only toys with him a little bit before depositing him back in his office.

He lays on the floor for a long time, staring at the ceiling, expecting at any moment for the vise-like grip of the Web to take hold of him once more. It keeps not happening. His breath starts to come faster and faster, so he forces himself to take deep breaths, but that only makes his shaky breathing sound louder in his ears. It’s all so loud, his breathing, his heartbeat. Even the electricity humming in the walls, the soft rattle of the air conditioner.

He brings a hand to his face, and his eyes are filled with tears that immediately start tumbling over his cheeks. A sob hitches in his chest, and he almost smiles. He’s wanted to have a breakdown for so long, and now—it’s almost pleasant, losing control of his emotions in the safety of his office. No one around to jeer and laugh at him. No spiderwebs forcing him to keep smiling.

Another sob hitches, and he suddenly feels much too exposed. He pulls himself under his desk, relishing the darkness, the smallness. He brings his knees to his chest, wrapping his arms around himself. Lets himself cry, burying the sound as much as he can. He doesn’t want the others to hear.

The door opens, and he lets out a soft gasp, biting down on his sobs. He holds his breath, willing himself to be quiet, to not be heard, not be found. He’s petrified that being found will mean his break is over, will mean the Web comes back, invading his mind.

It’s Martin. He comes in, humming quietly, and sets something on Jon’s desk. He starts to leave, and then—

Jon suddenly takes a sharp inhale, unable to hold his breath any longer.

Martin’s footsteps pause, hesitantly.

Something in Jon’s brain—the spiderwebs, he knows—pulls at him to be quiet, to let Martin leave, to not bother him with this. But it’s been so long since Jon’s seen Martin, and he just—He just wants to see him. Even if it means he has to smile. Surely, surely Martin will see that something is wrong, won’t he? The thought brings fresh tears to his eyes, and he says, “Martin?” His voice is thick with tears and rough from disuse. 

“Wha—Jon?” Martin says. His footsteps move quickly to the other side of the desk, and he crouches down. “Oh my god, Jon! What happened? Where have you been?”

“Circus got me,” Jon says with a watery smile. The Web hasn’t taken hold yet. And it’s so nice to see Martin, soft and warm and safe.

“This—this whole time, you’ve been with the Circus?” Martin says, sounding horrified.

Jon nods. “How long have I been gone?”

“A month,” Martin says. “Christ, are you alright?”

The spiderwebs tell Jon to send Martin away, to claim that he’s fine. But the compulsion isn’t as strong as it was before. It’s a request, not an order. And Jon is… He isn’t fine. He hasn’t been fine in a long time.

Besides, it’s not like Martin somehow missed the dirty tear tracks on his face.

“No,” he whispers, curling up tighter into himself. The shaking is back now. A month. A month of intruding hands rubbing lotion into his skin, constantly reminding him of their plans for him, telling him how much it would hurt, letting him hear the horrible screams of their other victims.

“Can I touch you?” Martin asks, and Jon nods.

Martin pulls Jon into his arms, both of them still partially under the desk. He’s warm, and his words are soft as he runs a soothing hand up and down Jon’s back. Jon buries his head in his chest, crying until he’s all wrung out, until nothing remains inside of him.

“Sorry,” Jon says, still sniffling slightly, his voice thick. There’s a damp patch on Martin’s shirt now, and Jon flushes a bit, looking at it.

“It’s alright, Jon,” Martin says, still holding on to him. He isn’t shifting impatiently, or acting like Jon should move away, so Jon doesn’t. He rests his head on Martin’s shoulder, exhausted, and Martin continues rubbing soothing circles into his back.

***

Jon wakes up on the cot in document storage, tucked in under several blankets. He spends a hazy moment wishing Martin were there with him, and then the spiderwebs re-exert themselves in full force and he is getting out of bed. Well. He hardly expected the break to last forever. He was lucky to get this much, really. The terror has lessened, and it feels like he can think in a straight line for once.

He heads out of document storage and towards the break room. It’s dark in the Archives. Everyone has left for the day, except for Martin, who didn’t want to leave Jon alone. He’s run out to fetch them both dinner, and will be back shortly.

The Web steers him to the utensil drawer, which is a disorganized mess, as always. He thinks about his feelings for Martin as he digs through it, the deep fondness he feels for him. He’s still holding on to a bit of hope that Martin will save him from this, he realizes.

He finds a knife, and pulls it from the drawer, and suddenly he is very focused on what the Web wants from him. He sets the knife on the counter, and then rolls up his left shirt sleeve. With horror sinking into his gut, he sets his arm on the edge of the sink, picks up the knife again in his right hand. He holds it firmly, tight enough that it makes his newly-healed scar ache.

He knows what’s about to happen. He tries to stop it, but it’s like trying to stop gravity. His hand doesn’t so much as tremble as he slices into the soft skin just below his elbow.

He lets out a cry of pain, or fear, but continues to carve into his arm with the tip of the knife. He’s cutting deep into his flesh, and he doesn’t want to look as blood pours out of him. But he can’t look away.

After an eternity, Jon is finally allowed to drop the knife. It clatters into the sink, leaving a trail of blood droplets behind it. He stares at the wound for a second. Even obscured as it is by blood, he can tell it’s a spiderweb. A message. A punishment.

He feels suddenly nauseous, salt flooding his mouth, and he sinks to the floor, breathing deeply, trying not to be sick. There is so much blood.

A soft pull at his mind, almost gentle. Don’t let Martin see.

He doesn’t want to know what the Web will do to him, if he refuses. There isn’t much time before Martin gets back, so he has to hurry.

He’s still dripping blood everywhere, so that’s the first step. Stop the bleeding. The first aid kit is nearby, well-stocked as always. He grabs it down from the shelf, and then wets a few napkins, which he uses to clean off as much of the blood as possible. It hurts, and he has to sit down before he finishes. It’s a bit tricky, wrapping his own arm in gauze, especially with his right hand injured as well, but he manages, adding layer after layer until he can no longer see the blood soaking through.

He rolls his sleeve down. The bulk of the gauze is visible through his shirt, but hopefully Martin won’t notice something he isn’t looking for.

Jon wipes down the table, the floor, the sink, until he can no longer see any blood anywhere. He washes the knife and drops it back in the drawer. And then he sits down, taking deep, even breaths. He should probably go lay down again, but he doesn’t think he can make it all the way back there. Not on his own.

He puts his head down, and a few minutes later, he hears the stairs creaking with Martin’s return. He hears his footsteps receding as he heads towards document storage, hears the soft creak of the door. And then the steps get louder, until Martin pokes his head into the break room.

“Oh, there you are,” he says, a relieved smile on his face. “Sorry for leaving you. I didn’t think you would wake up. I brought dinner,” he says, holding up the bag of takeout clutched in his hands.

Jon smiles in return. “The Eye told me,” he says.

“Oh, that’s—creepy,” Martin says.

“Sorry,” Jon says, his eyes flicking back to the table.

“It’s fine,” Martin says, sitting down across from him. “How are you feeling?”

The Web isn’t controlling him, but it hardly matters. “I’m fine,” he says. “Feeling better.”

***

They finish eating, and Martin insists on staying the night with Jon in the Archives. He insists that Jon sleep on the cot, even though the break room couch is much too small for Martin to sleep on comfortably.

Jon wakes up, and the fresh wound on his forearm has bled through the gauze, staining not only his shirt sleeve, but also the rest of his shirt. He’s covered in blood, so much that he can’t possibly hide it.

And he can hear Martin, already awake and moving around in the Archive.

Jon stands up, trying to decide what to do. If Martin sees the blood, he will ask questions, and there is no good way to explain the design so intricately carved into Jon’s arm. He needs fresh gauze, and a fresh shirt, but his extra clothes are in his office, and the first aid kit is in the break room.

He decides to make a break for his office, wrapping a blanket around his shoulders to hide any blood Martin might spot. Before he can move, however, the door to document storage opens, and Jon freezes.

“Hey Jon, I wanted to ask—” Martin stops, and for a moment they’re just staring at each other. Martin opens his mouth again, panic writ large on his face. “Jon, is that blood? What happened?”

“I—um—”

“Was it the Circus?” Martin asks, stepping closer. Jon flinches away from him, and he stops. “Okay, just—Jon, that looks really bad.”

“Yeah,” Jon manages, his voice coming out in an almost-laugh. Martin’s look of concern only grows deeper.

There’s no way for Jon to salvage this, no explanation that Martin will accept. Martin can’t know about this, can’t know about any of this. The Web might hurt him, if he becomes a danger to it.

And then—

He suddenly can see the exact strings he needs to pull in Martin’s mind, to make him ignore this. It’ll be easy. Martin won’t even know he’s done anything.

It’s the only option.

For the first time, Jon uses the spiderwebs. Martin’s eyes go blank and glassy for a single horrifying moment. And then he blinks, and looks at Jon. Jon is still covered with his own blood, but Martin doesn’t notice it at all. He looks vaguely confused for a second, before he gathers himself. “Sorry, lost my train of thought,” he says with a small laugh. “I was going to ask if you wanted to go get something for breakfast. I know you usually just skip it, but there’s a nice cafe not to far from here, and I thought it would be… good.”

Jon wants to cry. He wants to tell Martin everything, ask for his help. But Martin can’t help him. Asking will do nothing but hurt both of them.

Instead, Jon smiles. “Sounds wonderful,” he says.

[ask-them-bois]

Muzzle the Monster, Cage Its Teeth

(A drabble about the first time Alaric donned its muzzle.)

TW: cannibalism mention, cannibalism attempt, kinda gross description of eating raw meat.

.

Alaric sighed, dropping its forehead onto its knee. Its eyes ached to close, its hair falling in a curtain around its head. It was so tired, so scared....

So hungry.

A new hunger, that no amount of grilled cactus or fish could quench. It had been in the desert for... how long now? Half a sweep? More? It all felt the same to Alaric. Day and night meant nothing to a creature that could withstand both.

Its new thirst for blood is what had kept it from finding its way out of its endless, sandy prison. Its heart ached, just as much as its gastric sac, for a different sort of fulfillment- that of the company of its fellow trolls.

But Alaric would not return to the cities and towns. Not now, not ever. It was not safe. Its hunger too great. It could hold back the tide, but only just. Everything ached.

Everything was empty.

Its prosthetic hummed against its forehead, a puff of exhaust steam warming the jadeblood’s face and stirring its hair.

Taking a breath, Alaric raised its head and looked around. It had stepped out of its cavern for a breath of fresh air, the cold desert night searing its lungs. On a clear night, like this one, it could see all the way to the beast’s skeleton, the ivory remains gleaming under the twin moons’ silvery light. Alaric didn’t know what the beast was, or where it came from, or how long it had been there, but the giant figure was a comfort, as the sightless sockets kept watch over Alaric’s cavern.

The jadeblood got to its feet, closing its eyes and swaying on the spot as dizziness overwhelmed it. Hunger gnawed at its stomach, clawed at its throat, despite Alaric having eaten only an hour or so prior.

It turned and went back inside.

Down, down, to the lowest chamber of the cavern, it sought out the mothergrub that resided there. She wasn’t like the others of her kind. She was ancient, her carapace turned an array of dull colors that encapsulated the entire hemospectrum. She was defected, no longer able to produce “normal” grubs, but Alaric fed her and tended to her all the same. She chirred when Alaric approached, leaning down to nuzzle its head in greeting.

Her current brood, of fourteen, were clambering about her body, enjoying their time outside of the vats before the sun rose. Each and every one them, deformed in some way.

Alaric scooped the nearest one up; a goldblood with four eyes, all of different colors. His body was still soft from recent hatching; it’d harden in the coming weeks, and Alaric would send for lusii to come take the grubs away.

The little goldblood trilled as Alaric held it up, the grub’s six horns still fuzzy with velvet. The fuzz would fall off eventually, as the horns hardened and the grub prepared for pupation.

It always saddened the jadeblood to see the little ones go, but it was happy that it at least gave them a chance. Alternia needed mutants, whether it realized it or not. They were good, and fun, and Alaric found more kinship with the abnormal than with those that conformed to their colors.

Alaric set the gold on its shoulder, where the little grub dutifully clung to its vest, pressing his face into Alaric’s neck for warmth. Alaric had little warmth to offer, but the grub didn’t seem to mind, his whole, little body vibrating as he buzzed.

With its companion on its shoulder, Alaric went about cleaning up and preparing to feed the grubs. While the grubmother watched the other thirteen, Alaric swept up, and fetched the protein sludge that the grubs fed on.

It finished setting up the feeding station, before it whistled, calling for the grubs to come eat. Alaric set the little gold down, and it scampered off for its bowl. Alaric watched the other grubs tumble off the grubmother to join their brother, their excited squeals and chirps echoing around the chamber.

Alaric turned to watch them approach, grinning at the sight of the little swarm, when it froze like an antler-beast in headlights.

Time seemed to slow down as it saw the little blueblood with too many legs trip and fall off the grubmother’s tall back, instead of sliding down her tail like the rest.

Before it could register that it had moved, Alaric was across the room, catching the grub in its arms, and the little blue let out a sharp squeal of pain.

Alaric snapped back to itself as a smell hit its nose.

Blood.

Its eyes widened in horror at the sight of a small cut on the blueblood’s squishy body, one of the spikes on Alaric’s glove shimmering with the indigo ichor. Droplets beaded up on the wound, which was barely the length of Alaric’s fingernail and as thin as paper. To the reeling Alaric, to the whimpering grub, it was the size of a bullet wound.

Back then, before the crash, before it went rogue, Alaric would have known what to do. Even now, its thinkpan and instincts were screaming in tandem, urging it to go put the grub in the medicalizer, but Alaric couldn’t move, knelt next to the grubmother’s belly, with a bleeding grub in its hands.

Bleeding.

It was so... so...

Hungry.

Its stomach seized and snarled, like Alaric had never eaten a thing in its life, as the scent of blood filled its lungs. Its vision went white, its teeth aching, mouth suddenly flooded with saliva.

Bite, its brain urged, bite him. Feed. He is helpless, weak. Easy prey. Easy food.

Alaric wasn’t certain what happened next. It could recall feeling the grub’s body against its teeth. It had been so soft- softer than the blood-drained meat of the other trackscuttler crash victims. It couldn’t think, its body moving on its own.

And then it was struck, hard, on the temple, and Alaric reeled backwards, its head slamming to the stone floor. Pain exploded through its skull and sparking down its spine as its horn collided with the ground. Overwhelmed, it may have passed out for a moment.

When it came to, it managed to sit up, and it saw Otcheedad, its own lusus, with the grub held safely in his mouth. The otter-beast carefully set the little grub down, and licked the wound clean, urging the grub to go eat, before he returned to his charge.

Alaric slumped against the mothergrub, its stomach roiling with disgust and horror in equal measures, as it realized what it had nearly done.

Otcheedad glared at Alaric ruefully, before he walked away, only to return and drop a raw fish in its lap.

Eat that, not your grubs, the lusus seemed to say, before he went to watch over the little brood.

With shaking hands, Alaric picked up the fish and bit into it, blood and juices exploding into its mouth. It tore at the flesh and lapped up the blood, its clever tongue easily sliding between the bones so that it could suck up the fish’s innards.

When there was little left but bones, Alaric opened its eyes. Tossing the skeletal remains aside, it stumbled to its feet. Otcheedad would see to the grubs returning to their recuperacoons in its absence.

It wasn’t enough, though. It would never be enough. Alaric was drinking gilded gold, when it needed the real thing. The creature’s blood was a shameful echo of what it really needed.

It had to get away, the gnawing hunger demanding more than fucking fish blood.

It made its way outside, and mounted its all-terrain buggy. Sliding its goggles down, the machine roared to life and Alaric sped off, back towards the trackscuttler it had made into its hive.

It hurried inside, towards its respiteblock. It made its way to its writing desk, and ripped one of the drawers open, digging inside.

Where was it? Alaric tossed out journals, pens, quills and bottles in its frantic search. It could have sworn its teeth had grown, pressing against its lips.

It had bought the device some nights ago, as a precaution, if it really couldn’t control its urges. It didn’t think it would need the thing so soon, though, it’d wanted to try to control them before then, but-

The grub’s pained squeak came back to it, and it had to resist the urge to throw up. 

There! Throwing aside a diary of poems, it saw the contraption.

It pulled the thing out. Exiting the trackscuttler, it made its way down to the oasis- the only place it could see its reflection, for it had destroyed all the mirrors.

Kneeling at the water’s edge, it stared at its warped reflection as it slid the device on. The metal bits of the straps stung, freezing cold, against its jaw and cheeks.

The muzzle fit, though. It secured the device behind its head, and tugged on the front to make sure it would stay in place. It bit into the bridge of Alaric’s nose, and pinched its jaw. It hurt, but the pain was less than what Alaric felt, constantly, in its stomach.

Alaric could only just open its mouth, just enough to speak.

“It’s for your own good.” It told its reflection, its voice shaking, “So you don’t hurt anyone else.”

Alaric could have sworn its reflection looked mournful, and it agreed. It hated the thing it now wore, but it saw no other way.

It was a monster. It deserved to be caged. It deserved to suffer, and starve.

It was so, so hungry.

[brattyfics]

Hello! Can I please request a Miguel story with “Why do you keep lying to me?” and “I don’t love you anymore.”

Summary: “Why do you keep lying to me?” and “I don’t love you anymore.” | Part Two | Part Three |

Pairing: Miguel Galindo x Reader

Warnings: Dark-ish Miguel, cheating, verbal abuse.

Word count: 1K

You sat in the living room of your spacious home bundled up in a long, plush robe while you waited for your husband to return home. The digital clock on your phone told you it was well after two am. You felt tired, eyes and limbs heavy but you couldn’t bring yourself to go to sleep. Not this time.

If you were honest with yourself, you knew Miguel was cheating long before you found his receipt to a lingerie store. You analyzed each item and it’s description to be sure Miguel had never brought those items home to you. Besides, his behavior in the past year also told you he was in another relationship.

He was always gone. That wasn’t new for Miguel as he was a busy man. Two day trips across the border in Mexico had turned into five and by the way he kept tabs on you, you were certain he didn’t even bother with taking his mistress all the way to Mexico. The security guards were always receiving calls from him when you were out, tracking your location and you figured it was because he didn’t want you to run into them.

You almost couldn’t believe what you had allowed yourself to become. Miguel had chased you for months before you accepted his invitation for a date. You were once a woman like a beautiful bird no one could catch. Miguel fed you, stroked your feathers, and lured you into a fall sense of security. Now he just kept you in a gilded cage.

Miguel entered through said gilded cage wearing a dumb, lovestruck smile on his face. You remembered when he wore that expression for you. You felt bitter that he was in so deep with the woman that he couldn’t stop thinking of her even as he entered through the doors of your home. Seeing the look on your face, Nestor got his attention, slinking back outside to give you privacy. You watched as the man you loved put on a mask and transformed right before your eyes.

“What are you doing up, mi amor?” You grimaced at the pet name, turning your head when he leaned down to kiss you. The smell of an unfamiliar perfume washed over you, pissing you off even further.

“Where were you?” Your icy tone had him taking a step back. The bastard had the audacity to have an annoyed expression on his face.

“A business dinner.” Liar.

“With who?”

“No one you know.”

You chuckled, turning away from him. He was still as handsome as the day he met, but he repulsed you.

“Why do you keep lying to me?”

“What are you talking---?”

You held your hand up, stopping him mid-sentence the way he did to everyone else, including you. You smirked, seeing the fire that blazed in his eyes at being interrupted. Good.

“What’s the point? Why lie when we both know the truth?” You trembled as your voice rose.

“Why bother with coming home when this is obviously not where you want to be?” You held your hands together to try to stop the shaking.

“Why do you keep me here when you don’t want me anymore?” Your voice broke, raw emotion showing through.

Miguel stood over you as stoic as ever, nothing indicated he was caught.

“I don't know what you’re even talking about, mi amor.” His condescending tone made you feel sick to your stomach. You hadn’t really expected for him to tell the truth, but an outright denial of what was clear was an insult to your intelligence. “Every time I leave this house I do it for us, for this family.”

“Bullshit.” The word tumbled out of your mouth before you could even stop it. Slowly and subtly, Miguel had groomed you to speak to him a certain way. You gnawed on your bottom lip out of nervousness but you didn’t regret your words.

“What did you say?” He was giving you a chance to correct yourself. Instead, you took a deep breath and repeated yourself.

“I said, that’s bullshit.” You leaned forward on the couch, a charge running through your body.

“You’re a sick motherfucker!” Once you started, you couldn’t stop, the words spilling out of your mouth like vomit. “You think you can do whatever you want to me and I’ll still be here, just because you say so?”

You expected him to snap, grab your neck, or even strike you but he did none of those things. He was too arrogant to even argue, too confident he had you trapped.

“I’m done talking about this. Good night.”

He turned his back to you, moving towards the stairs. You were certain you resembled a cartoon character with the way your eyes bulged out of your head. Your fingers desperately scrambled to pick up your phone, chucking it across the room at his head. You missed but the sound of it whooshing past his head made him whip around.

You froze at the dangerous look in his eyes.

“I’m tired too! And you know what else? I don’t love you anymore!”

“What?” He gave you another chance to tuck your tail between your legs and scurry off, but you were done shrinking yourself for him.

“I don’t love you anymore. I don’t want to turn a blind eye while you cheat anymore.” Each step he took towards you was menacing, a promise of retribution in his eyes.

“I don’t want to try to fill the emptiness in my heart with material things anymore. I don’t want any of this--” You gestured to glittering wealth all around you. You didn’t want to live in the multi-million dollar home anymore if it meant you couldn’t be happy. You just hoped he would see it your way.

He finally stood in front of you, frame towering over yours as you sat. “You know what? I think you feel the same, Mikey. Otherwise, you wouldn’t do the things--”

“This is the last time I’m going to tell you. We’re done having this conversation.”

“But--”

“We’re done talking about this. I’m going upstairs to shower and then I’ll meet you in our bed.”

“Miguel, you can’t just ignore everything I said. I want out!” The words hung heavy between the two of you. He chuckled darkly, petting your head like a puppy.

“There’s only one way out for you, mi amor. La muerte. We made vows, promised ourselves to each other for better or worse. You’re mine-- El Diablo’s wife until the day you die.” Your mouth hung open in horror. You knew the man Miguel was but he rarely showed his true face to you.

“The only way you’ll stop being Mrs.Galindo is if you’re six feet under. Even then, you’ll still be mine in name.” His hands dropped to his sides, a condescending look of pity on his face.

“You’d make things a lot easier on us both if you would just accept that I own you until the day you die. Now, goodnight.”

Taglist

@woahitslucyylu @briannab1234 @sheeshgivemeabreak @breakingnewsin-no-oneasked @angelreyesgirl @blessedboo @glimmerglittergirl @apantherinmypastlife @brownsugarcoffy @marvelmaree

[fortune-fool02]

Free

Child Robert E.O Speedwagon x unicorn female reader

Requested by: anonymous 

Request: Child Speedwagon meeting a captive unicorn reader in a traveling circus, freeing them from the cage and helping the unicorn escape.

Unicorn AU

Please enjoy. 

Word had spread around London of the approaching moving circus. Advertisements flying around about the wonders it would hold. Not of regular tricks or displays, but ones of the impossible and wildest imaginations. A circus that held captured creatures of myth. Beasts that thrived in stories be seen in the flesh, real and true. 

As expected, the advertising had attracted many guests to witness the claims and see for themselves. People of all ages came to see if the rumour were true, as well as the stories. A young, golden haired boy, barely in his teen years, also frequently snuck inside, wanting to see. Speedwagon couldn’t help himself but keep coming back, ever since he saw that these creatures were true, he kept coming back when every display show was on to see them. 

To see her. 

The unicorn. 

[Colour] coat of soft fur that looked softer than clouds could ever hope to be. A [Hair colour] mane that flowed gracefully like the waves of a flowing stream of water, her tail sharing its grace. Everything about her radiated grace and peace, pulling at something deep within his soul that even he didn’t know about. A mix of awe but also sorrow. Her [Eye colour] orbs glowed with such sorrow for being captured and forced onto display; snatched away from her home, her family. 

Each time he went there, he looked only at her. Others saw her too, but they only looked at her for her beauty and grace, seeming to be ignoring the pain in her eyes. Begging silently for someone, anyone, to help her. And yet they all stared and gawked at her until the ringleader shooed them away. Speedwagon kept low and hidden as he did, noticing the way people’s expressions would drop as they looked away from the unicorn, as if something was taken from them that they may never regain again. 

“Oi, kid! Scram!” One of the employees of the ringleader shouted after spotting Speedwagon, who quickly slipped out before they could have a chance to grab him. The unicorn watching him the entire time. At one point, he thought he could hear her speak to him, a whisper among the wind, begging for his help. Those bright, beautiful eyes in his mind throughout the day, the pain weighing heavy upon his shoulders, gnawing and festering within his gut.

That night, he couldn’t sleep without seeing those eyes. That pain and sorrow that stared at him, begging for his help. He could not allow her to remain in that cage. Not something as pure as she. With this in mind, Speedwagon got up and rushed towards the circus. 

The grounds were silent aside from some guards moving around to ensure the creatures were in cages still and everything was in order. It wasn’t much to be concerned about as Speedwagon had broken into and trespassed in places similar to this. He knew how to be careful. The image of the unicorn’s cage was present in his mind, telling him what to search for, thus taking him only a few minutes to find her cage. 

Smiling, he quickly made his way over to her, keeping his footsteps quiet. As well as his voice. “Hey. Over here.” Her ears twitched before she turned her head towards the voice, surprise flashing across her [Eye colour] orbs, her voice also quiet. 

“What are you doing here?” She questioned, a mix of curiosity and surprise stitched into her tone at the fact that he was actually here again. The young boy smiled simply and quickly got to work on trying to pick the series of locks on her cage door. 

“I’m gettin’ you outta here.” he answered, keeping his voice low. “You don’t deserve to be trapped like this.” His words sparked hope within her, something she had not felt since her capture. The locks clicked open one at a time as he worked through them before the cage door quietly creaked open, allowing her the sweet taste of freedom. Smiling, Speedwagon quietly guided her away from the circus grounds, hoping none of the men would spot them. 

Once they were away, Speedwagon turned to her, “There, you’re free now. Go.” She turned and looked at him, a softness in her [Eye colour] eyes that had replaced the heart-aching sorrow, instead, now a fluttering warmth coursed through Speedwagon at them. A sense of peace. 

“Thank you I shall not forget this for as long as I live.” She spoke, lowering down to his height and lightly nuzzling against him, careful of her horn. Speedwagon smiled, nuzzling back and petting her. 

“What’s your name? I’m Robert Speedwagon.” The light in her eyes glowed again, sparking like fireflies on a moonlit night. 

“I am [Name], Robert.” She said, “We shall meet again someday, I can promise you that.” 

[wistfulcynic]

The Meet-Cute (2 of 2)

In which Ruby decides that what Emma’s love life needs is a good old-fashioned meet-cute, and sets about arranging one for her. Or two, or three, or six... whatever, she’ll set up however many it takes for her friend to meet The One. But it may turn out that Emma doesn’t need any help finding The One after all...

First part on Tumblr and AO3 

a/n: this chapter contains sweetness, quite a lot of silliness, and a big ol’ hot kiss. 

Thanks to @optomisticgirl for the idea and @thisonesatellite, @ohmightydevviepuu, and @katie-dub for support and general delightfulness. 

-

PART TWO:

The next day was Wednesday and Emma spent the morning on patrol, driving around Storybrooke and trying not to think about how far away Friday was. She was just about to take a break and go to Granny’s for some coffee when her phone rang. The name on the screen was just about the last one she would ever have expected, and she frowned hard at it for the space of a good four rings before answering. 

“Graham?” 

“Hey, Emma.” His voice was just as she remembered it, gruff and accented. And faintly apologetic, which was new. “Um. Long time.” 

“Yeah, I guess you could say that. How’s life in the woods?”

“Ah, yeah, it’s good. And, um, about that. It’s actually why I’m calling. Because I can’t come in to town, I mean.” 

“Well I didn’t think it was because you wanted to catch up on old times,” said Emma drily. “What’s the problem?” 

“It’s my truck.” Graham paused and the silence stretched. 

“Your truck?” Emma prompted, her patience wearing thin. She was not in the mood for Graham’s strong-and-silent schtick today.  

“My truck.” He sighed. “It—well, it seems to be out of gas.” 

Emma rubbed her temples. “And how is your lack of forward planning the responsibility of the Storybrooke Sheriff’s Department?” she asked, in a voice just shy of a snap. 

“Well that’s the thing, I did forward plan,” said Graham. “I had a full tank last night because I knew that today I needed to drive to Portland. There’s a forestry convention I’m going to—well, it’s not important, but I wanted to get an early start so I made sure everything was ready before I went to bed last night. Then this morning I wake up to find my tank empty and the spare can missing.”

A creeping suspicion was beginning to crawl up Emma’s spine. “So you think, what, someone stole your gas?” 

“I know it sounds crazy, but honestly I can’t come up with any other explanation.” 

“Graham, do you happen to know Ruby Lucas?” 

He paused, and when he spoke again his voice was confused. “Ah, the woman at the diner?” 

“That’s her.” 

“I chat with her whenever I go there, maybe once or twice a month. She seems nice. Why?” 

“No reason.” Emma glowered through her windshield at Granny’s sign as she drove past it. “Listen, I can bring you a can of gas but it’ll take me at least half an hour to get it and get out to you. Does that leave you enough time to get to Portland?” 

“Yeah, it should. I’ll have to change my plans a bit, but it’ll be okay. Only, Emma, what about the person who emptied my tank—” 

Emma set her jaw as she pulled into the gas station. “I’ll take care of it.” 

—

Thursday morning found her in Granny’s early, marching up to the counter with her fists planted on her hips. 

“I could arrest you, you know. I probably should.” 

“What?” Ruby blinked innocent eyes as she prepared Emma’s coffee, with plenty of milk and extra cinnamon and hazelnut syrups. “What did I do?” 

“Emptying a gas tank is stealing, Rubes. You’ve got to stop doing this stuff!” 

Ruby handed her the coffee, and a bag containing a fresh bear claw. Emma scowled at it as Ruby asked “Did it get you a date, at least?” 

“It did not. At least, not in this decade.” 

“Um.” Ruby frowned. “What?” 

“I already dated Graham.” Emma decided that while the bear claw was unmistakably a bribe she could always just eat the evidence, and took a big bite. 

“You did?” Ruby demanded. “When?” 

“I’m surprised you don’t remember,” muttered Emma around her mouthful of pastry and nuts. “It wasn’t long after I moved to Storybrooke. Just before he decided to ‘escape the cage of civilisation’ and moved out to the middle of nowhere.” 

“Wait, wait. It’s coming back to me now. Are you saying that Graham is Mountain Lodge Guy?” 

“Yep.” 

“Fuuuuck Ems, I’m sorry.” To her credit, Ruby did look genuinely apologetic. 

“Well you should be,” retorted Emma, hardening her heart. “And you should stop doing this, Ruby! It’s getting ridiculous. I mean, it was always ridiculous but now it’s branching into minor-felony-level ridiculous. Please, I am begging you, stop.” 

“Ah,” said Ruby, biting her lip. “Um, can I stop tomorrow?” 

Emma’ blood ran cold. “Why?”

“I—may have already put the next plan into motion.” 

“What? What plan?” Emma demanded, just as her phone started ringing. 

Ruby grimaced. “Let’s just say you’d probably better answer that.” 

—

Emma took a deep breath and squared her shoulders before knocking firmly on the door of a large, sprawling house on the edge of town. It swung open immediately to reveal a man wearing a frantic expression, his dark hair standing up on end. 

“Oh, thank God!” he cried, falling to his knees. “Thank God.” The dog at the end of the leash Emma had looped around her hand wriggled in delight as he licked the man’s face. The man hugged the dog tightly, laughing as his cheeks was thoroughly washed. “How’d you find him?” he asked. 

Emma watched the reunion with a reluctant smile. “I had a tip,” she replied wryly. “Someone spotted him in the street and managed to grab him. They let the sheriff’s department know, and we cross-checked his description with reports of missing dogs.” Or at least that’s what she would have done had the dog actually been missing, and not lured into the backseat of a car by Ruby armed with a juicy steak. The dog had spent the morning in the storage room of the diner, gnawing happily at the bone for an hour before taking a long nap on a cosy blanket. And now he was home again, unharmed and with a belly full of steak. All in all not a bad morning for him, Emma reflected, though she felt sorry for his owner. 

The owner who was now rising to his feet and eyeing Emma with the eye of a man who, reassured of his beloved pet’s safety, could turn his attention to other matters. 

“I’m August,” he said, offering his hand. “August Booth.” 

Emma knew this of course, because Ruby had told her, but she took his hand anyway. “Emma Swan.” 

“Emma,” August repeated. “I’ve seen you around, obviously, but—well it’s nice to finally meet you. Can I offer you a drink or anything?” 

She shook her head. “Thanks, but no. I’m on duty and I really should get back to it.” 

“Of course.” He gave her a hopeful smile, as the dog bounced cheerfully at his side. “Another time, maybe?” 

“Ah, maybe.” Emma’s own smile was noncommittal. “Have a nice day.” 

“You too. Emma.” 

__

Emma got home that evening to find Henry with a huge grin on his face and an A on his solar system project. 

“Look, Mom!” he cried, waving the paper at her. “Mr Johnson said it was one of the best projects he’s ever seen!” 

“Wow, that’s great, Henry!” Emma took the paper and examined it with a beam of pride. “Well done!” 

“I can’t wait to tell Killian.’ Henry was bouncing on his heels. “Can we call him? Maybe he can come over again!” 

“Um, it’s a bit late to invite him over now,” Emma hedged. The truth was that she’d been looking for an excuse to text Killian since he’d left her place on Tuesday night, but was also not sure he’d want her bothering him. “But you can tell him tomorrow.” 

“Is he coming over tomorrow?” 

“Um, yeah. We’re going out.” 

“Out?” Henry’s eyes went wide. “Like on a date?” 

“Yeah. Is that okay?” 

“Mom, you don’t need to ask me if you want to date someone. It’s your life.” 

Emma shook her head, lips pressing together in a bittersweet smile. Sometimes her little baby boy seemed so grown up. It had been happening more and more often lately and though she loved to see it, it also gave her an aching twinge in her heart. 

“But you’re the most important thing in my life,” she said firmly, “and I’m not going to date someone you don’t like.” 

“Well, I like Killian. So as far as I’m concerned, date away.” 

She laughed, and pulled him into a hug. “So you can wait until tomorrow to tell him about your project?” 

Henry heaved a great sigh, though his eyes were laughing. “I suppose.” 

—

Henry may have been able to wait, but Emma found she couldn’t. Barely two hours later, after they’d eaten dinner and Henry had settled down to do his homework, Emma found her fingers typing out a text to Killian without her permission, and sending it before her brain had a chance to object. 

Emma: Henry got an A on his solar system project. 

She held her breath after she clicked send, nerves fluttering in her belly. But it was barely a minute before three dots appeared below her message and then Killian’s reply. 

Killian: That’s brilliant! Tell him I said well done. 

Emma heaved a breath and felt her lips curve in a silly grin. I think he’d rather tell you himself, she texted back. I was just too excited to wait. 

The reply came almost immediately. Your secret is safe with me, love, it said. I’ll pretend it’s the first I’m hearing of the news. 

The silly smile was still on Emma’s face as she tried to think of a way to extend the conversation. Before she could come up with anything the three dots appeared again followed shortly by a message. 

Killian: How was your day, Swan? Any exciting crime on the mean streets of Storybrooke?

Emma’s cheeks began to hurt as her grin widened further, and she settled in to regale Killian with the story of the dog, minus a few key details of course. When she finished he told her about a frustrating patron he’d had, who was looking for a very particular book but could not remember its title or author, or in fact any details about its plot or characters. All he could recall was that it had red on its cover. 

Which, as I’m sure you can imagine, did not much narrow things down, Killian remarked. 

The conversation drifted then onto other topics, flowing so easily that before Emma knew it they had been texting for three hours. When she finally got to bed that night—an hour later than usual—she drifted off with a smile still on her face, thinking of him and of their date the next day. 

—

Wear something warm, Killian had said, and so late on Friday afternoon Emma changed out of the thin blouse she’d worn all day and into a sweater. A new sweater, one she’d bought on an impromptu trip to the boutique that morning. It would be winter soon, she’d reasoned, and she could always use another warm layer. It was definitely not because the sweater was a pretty shade of rose pink that complimented her complexion and made her feel soft and feminine, or because its slim fit hugged her breasts in a very flattering way. 

Not at all. 

She finished the look with dark jeans and a brown leather jacket with a sheepskin trim and headed out into the living room, ten minutes early. 

Henry was watching TV but when she came into the room he looked up and his eyes widened. “You look awesome, Mom!” he said. 

“Thanks, kid.” Emma rubbed her damp palms on her jeans. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt so nervous. “Are you sure you’re okay with staying here by yourself?” she asked Henry, who rolled his eyes. 

“Yes, I’m sure,” he said. “I have your number and Killian’s number and the hospital’s number and Mary Margaret’s number. Mary Margaret is just upstairs if I need her and she’ll come in to check on me at bedtime and make sure I’m not throwing any wild parties.” He gave Emma a sardonic look and she couldn’t suppress a chuckle. “Dinner’s in the fridge,” Henry continued, “I’m supposed to do my homework so it’s done for the weekend then I can play video games, and you’ll be home by midnight. Did I forget anything?” 

She put her hands on her hips and shook her head at him. “No, I think that covers it.” 

He got up from the couch and gave her a hug. “I’ll be okay, Mom,” he said reassuringly. “It’s just for a few hours.” 

Emma nodded, squeezing him tightly. “I know.” He was still her baby, though, and it was a mother’s prerogative to worry. 

Henry seemed to sense her mood because he gave her a cheeky grin. “Be sure you’re home on time, though, or else I might turn into a pumpkin,” he teased.  

She laughed. “I promise.” 

Just then the doorbell rang, sending Emma’s heartbeat into overdrive. She took a deep breath and then another as she smoothed her hair and adjusted her clothes. Henry smirked at her and went to open the door. “Hey, Killian!” he greeted. 

“Hello, Henry,” Killian replied, and God, Emma thought, his voice was even sexier than she remembered. “How are you?” 

“Good,” said Henry brightly. “I got an A on my solar system project!” 

“That’s brilliant, lad!” said Killian, catching Emma’s eye and giving her a wink. Probably the least stealthy wink she’d ever seen, more of a full-face twitch. 

Fortunately, Henry was too busy grinning with delight to notice. “Thanks for helping me,” he said.  

“It was my pleasure.” Killian smiled at Henry but his eyes kept flitting to where Emma was standing behind him, hands clasped and trying not to twist them nervously. “Swan,” he said, transferring his smile to her. “You look lovely.” 

“Thanks.” Emma flushed at the compliment and searched for the right words to return it. Killian was dressed in a sweater as well, a thick fisherman’s one in a deep blue shade that brought out his eyes. “You look...” Hot. Gorgeous. Highly fuckab—gah. No. She shook that thought from her head. “…um…” 

He shot her a small smirk, one that said he knew what she was thinking, even as his cheeks went pink. “I know,” he said.  

She rolled her eyes. Of course he did. 

They stood grinning foolishly at each other until Henry gave a loud cough. 

“Ah.” Killian scratched behind his ear, the flush in his cheeks deepening. “Are you ready then, love?” he asked. 

She nodded. “Yeah, I think so. Henry, are you—” 

“Mom.” Henry gave her a stern look. “I’m fine. Go.” 

“All right, all right,” she sighed. “I’m going.” 

She allowed Killian to guide her out the door and down the stairs with a hand hovering just over the small of her back. From another man such a gesture would have felt controlling but from him it just seemed sweet—old-fashioned, like the way he spoke and the general air of courteousness he carried.  

“Where are we going?” she asked, when they exited her building and turned down the sidewalk. 

He smiled, soft and a bit nervous. “You’ll see.” 

They chatted lightly as they walked, conversation made easier by all they had shared in the texting marathon of the previous evening, and when they arrived at the docks a good twenty minutes later Emma felt as though no time had passed at all. 

“What are we doing here?” she asked, looking around in confusion. 

“Come with me.” He held out his hand and she took it without hesitation. Briefly she wondered at how easily she trusted this man she hardly knew, she who almost never trusted anyone, and then he led her up a gangplank and onto a long wooden sailing boat and she forgot everything else in her astonishment. 

“This is yours?” she exclaimed.

“Aye,” said Killian with a small shrug. “You can take the lad off the sea but you can’t take the sea out of the lad. Or something.” 

Emma laughed. “You bought this after you left the navy?” 

“I did,” he replied. “Lived on board for a few months. I was going to stay on her while I was in Storybrooke but Belle said that was ridiculous when there was an empty apartment above the library, so…” 

“Yeah. And doesn’t it get cold at night? On the boat I mean.” 

“I have blankets. And rum.” He waggled his eyebrows at her and she laughed. “But yes, the apartment is much more congenial as a place to sleep, so I’m grateful for it.” 

On the boat’s deck a blanket was spread out, with a pile of cushions on one side and a small camp stove on the other. “I thought we could make grilled cheese,” Killian explained. “Henry, ah, told me it was your favourite. And everything tastes better under the stars.” 

Emma felt a lump rising in her throat. “There—there aren’t any stars,” she said. 

Killian smiled at her. “Not yet.” 

She made herself comfortable on the blanket while Killian produced a leather satchel, from which he removed plates and napkins, bread and butter, and a dizzying array of cheeses. 

Emma gaped as he lined them up in front of the stove. “I usually just use the kind that comes in pre-wrapped slices,” she said. 

“Aye, I have some of that.” he replied, holding up a small, square parcel. “Though I thought, maybe, if you were in the mood for it, that you, ah—might be up for trying something new?” 

His expression was so hopeful, so open, and she knew that he wasn’t just talking about the cheese. He meant the way she’d been living, closed-off and untrusting. Alone. He was asking her to let him in, and God, Emma thought, she wanted to. 

“I—yeah.” She swallowed hard, but the smile she gave him was genuine. “I’d like that. But, I’m gonna be honest here, I have no idea which one.” 

Killian laughed, a deep, rich sound that warmed her inside and out. “Try the gouda,” he advised. 

“I don’t even know what that is,” she said, laughing with him. 

The warm smile remained on his lips but there was something deeply solemn in his eyes. “Do you trust me?” he asked. 

Emma swallowed again. “Yeah,” she replied, and it was true. She really did. 

Killian nodded. “Gouda,” he said firmly. 

She nodded back. “Okay.” 

—

The gouda turned out to be delicious, melting into the kind of stringy, gloopy mess that had Emma’s eyes rolling back in her head with delight. Its flavour was mild, almost nutty, and absolutely delicious—way better, she was sure, than the soft, smelly stuff Killian put on his bread. 

“This is amazing,” she said around a mouthful of melted cheese. “That, on the other hand…” 

He chuckled. “It’s an acquired taste.” 

“I’m sure. So... why exactly did you acquire it?” 

An odd look crossed Killian’s face. “Sometimes you eat what’s put in front of you, love, and learn to like it later,” he said, in a voice grim with not entirely pleasant memories. “I’ve been in places where to refuse the food would be a grave insult, and a grave insult could result in... well, let’s just call them unpleasant consequences.” 

“Wow.” 

He gave shrug and an offhand smile. “I mean, not to be dramatic or anything.” 

“Oh no, obviously not.” She munched her cheese, trying to think of a lighter topic. “So, um, what made you become a librarian? No offence but you don’t really seem the type.” 

“No, probably not.” His smile warmed and softened and Emma felt herself relax. “I wanted a quiet life after the navy and I’ve always loved books, so it seemed like a natural choice.” 

“Yeah, I guess I can see that.” 

“It’s been healing,” he said softly. “In more ways than one.” He was silent for a moment, then turned to her with a quirked eyebrow. “And what about you, Emma, what brought you into law enforcement?” he asked. 

“What don’t I seem like the type?” 

“On the contrary, it seems a perfect fit for you. I’d just—like to know you better.” 

Emma felt a flush rise in her cheeks as her heartbeat quickened. “I was in bail bonds before I came to Storybrooke, but there’s not much need for that here so I sort of fell into sheriffing,” she explained. “I didn’t even intend to move here, I was just passing through. But I had car trouble and got stuck for a while, then the job opened up and I just—stayed.” 

“It’s a good place to stay,” Killian remarked. 

“Yeah. Way better than where we were living in the city. Henry was really little when we moved and I’m glad he’s growing up in a place like this.” 

“Aye, it seems an ideal spot to raise a child.” 

There was a wistfulness in his voice that made her heart thump harder. “I just realised I never asked you where you live,” she said. 

“Ah.” He scratched behind his ear again. “That is a question. I’ve been in Boston for the past few years but I’m starting to think I need a change. One of the reasons I was glad for this break in Storybrooke.” 

Emma focused on keeping her breathing steady. “Where do you think you might go?” she asked. 

“I might”—he shot her a mildly wary glance—“stay here.” 

“Here? As in Storybrooke here?” 

“Aye. There’s a job opening up next year at the high school library that I’ve applied for.” 

“I—” She blinked in surprise. “Wow.” 

“I hope it doesn’t freak you out, love,” said Killian, stumbling over his words in his haste to speak them. “It wasn’t because of—well, it isn’t as though you aren’t a factor, but mostly I just—” 

“You could see a future here.” Emma nodded. “Hey, I get it. Same.” 

He visibly relaxed, expelling a long breath before continuing. “I actually put in the application before we met,” he explained. “About fifteen minutes before, in fact. But I’d be lying if I said the prospect of staying here didn’t grow considerably brighter when I realised there was a chance you could be part of that future.” His eyes widened when he realised what he’d said. “I mean, I—” 

“Yeah.” Emma reached for his hand and gave it a squeeze. “I know what you mean.” 

Dusk had fallen by that time, and the stars were beginning to appear in the sky. Killian quickly tidied up the plates and utensils and cheese, then produced from his seemingly bottomless satchel a thermos full of hot chocolate. 

“Mmmm,” said Emma, “that smells amazing. Though I usually have mine with some—”

“Cinnamon?” Killian grinned at her as he held up a small jar of the spice. “Aye.” 

“Henry told you,” guessed Emma. 

“That he did.” 

“When did you have time to mine my son for information about me?” she teased him. 

“We had some quite interesting conversation in between discussions of moons and planets,” he informed her. “It’s a truly wonderful boy you have, love.” 

“Yeah,” she agreed, accepting the steaming cup he offered her. “He really is.” 

Cradling their cups of chocolate, they relaxed back against the pillows and gazed up at the darkening sky. As the stars grew brighter Killian showed her some constellations, pointing to them with one hand while the other lay next to hers on the blanket, close enough that she could brush his little finger with her own. She slid her hand closer and let her fingers curl around his, and when he turned his hand to grip hers more firmly she relaxed against him, resting her head on his shoulder as they sipped their chocolate, looked up at the sky, and talked. They talked about everything, likes and dislikes, pastimes and pet hates. Their childhoods and their dreams for the future, their hopes and their fears. She told him, haltingly, about Neal, and he replied with the story of his affair with a married woman, which had led to him leaving the navy. For two such different people they had a surprising amount in common, she realised. Not so much in the specifics of their lives as in the way they looked at the world, and the experiences that had shaped them. Emma had never in her life felt so understood. 

All too soon her phone buzzed in her pocket, reminding her that it was almost midnight and she had promised Henry she’d be back before then. 

“I have to go,” she said apologetically. “Henry—” 

“Of course,” he replied. “I’ll walk with you.” 

He kept her hand in his as they stood and headed back to her apartment, twining his fingers with hers and brushing his thumb feather-light across her knuckles, setting her heart racing in her chest. His hand was warm and rough and the gentle movements of his thumb sent sparks dancing up her arm and all across her skin. 

When they reached her door she turned with a smile, still holding tight to his fingers, loath to break the contact until she absolutely had to. 

“I had a wonderful time,” she said. “We should do this again.” 

His own smile lit his face, stealing her breath as it always did. “Any time, love,” he murmured. “Perhaps next time we can go for a sail.” 

“I’d love that.” 

His eyes were soft as they caressed her face and she found herself holding her breath as they swayed in each other’s orbit, easing closer and closer, and then closer still until she felt his fingertips brushing across her cheek, until he cradled her jaw in his palm and their lips met. 

The kiss began gently, tentatively—sweet brushes of lips and sighs of breaths that soon grew deeper, hotter, more insistent as the hands they still held gripped tighter, as his fingers left her cheek to tangle in her hair and hers fisted in his sweater to pull him closer. A deep groan rumbled in his chest and Emma felt herself pushed back against the door, his lips insistent now, his tongue hot in her mouth and his body firm against hers. She released his sweater to curl her arm around his neck and hold him tight, pressing herself as close as she could get, rolling her hips over the hardness she could feel low against her belly. 

She couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt this way, if she ever had. Like she couldn’t get enough of him—his feel and smell and taste—like she wanted to tear off his clothes and have him right here, and damn the consequences. But also she felt safe, secure in the certainty that while he clearly wanted her just as much, once the kiss ended he would say goodnight and go, no pressure, no demands, no resentment. She was certain of this because she trusted him, and the inherent decency she’d sensed in him from the beginning.  That kind of trust was freeing, she realised in a bright and stunning flash of understanding. Wonderfully freeing, to let down her defences and put herself into the hands of another person, knowing he wouldn’t take advantage or use that trust to hurt her. Her heart soared as she hugged Killian tighter and kissed him with everything she had, and when the kiss finally ended and he rested his forehead against hers, all she felt was happiness and the stirrings, deep in her heart, of a far stronger emotion. 

“That was—” he gasped, blinking dazed eyes and clearly struggling for words. 

“Amazing?” she supplied. “Incredible? Hot as fuck?”

He gave a breathless chuckle. “One hell of a goodnight kiss. Plus yeah, all those other things.” 

He pressed another kiss on her lips, brief and chaste and gentle, then released her and stepped back. “I’ll call you tomorrow,” he said. 

Emma tried not to feel bereft at the loss of his warmth and closeness. “Maybe you could come over for dinner,” she said. “I mean, if you’re not busy. It’s just Henry would love to see you, and—” 

“I’d love that,” he said, gently interrupting her before her stream of words could get out of control. “Let me know what I can bring. Not brownies this time.” 

His eyes twinkled with amusement and she gave a slight wince. “Was it that obvious?” 

“I hope you won’t take this the wrong way, Emma, but you’re a bit of an open book,” he replied. “One I’d very much like to read more of.” 

“I—I’d like that too,” she said softly. “And my favourite dessert is lemon bars.” 

“Lemon bars I can manage.” He smiled, a bit wistfully but with a new light in his eyes that made her feel like she could fly. “Goodnight, Emma,” he murmured. 

“Night, Killian.” 

She watched him until he disappeared around the bend in the stairs then slipped into her apartment, shutting the door silently behind her and leaning against for a moment. She closed her eyes and ran the tip of her tongue over her lips, then gave herself a little shake and took off her jacket and shoes before padding silently into Henry’s room. He was fast asleep, with the blankets kicked off and bunched around his waist. She pulled them down and tucked them in around him. 

“Mom?” he muttered. 

“Yeah, kid. I’m home,” she whispered. “Go back to sleep.” 

Henry blinked heavy eyelids. “Did you have a good time?” 

“I did. I’ll tell you all about it tomorrow. Go back to sleep.” 

“K,” he replied, and in his next breath she could tell he was asleep again. 

—

The next morning Emma dropped Henry off at a friend’s house and went to Granny’s for some coffee. Ruby greeted her with a scowl. 

“You here alone?” she demanded.

Emma crossed her arms over her chest. “I am.” 

“August another no-go, then?” 

“I have to admit, he was closer than the others,” Emma conceded. “Probably your best attempt yet.” 

“But not good enough?” 

“Nope. Not good enough.” Perhaps once there may have been a time when someone like August would have caught Emma’s eye. Before Neal. Even, possibly, before she’d met Killian. But now...

Ruby planted a fist on her hip and shook her finger at Emma’s nose. “I’ll get you, Emma Swan,” she declared. “Sooner or later, come hell or high water, I will find the man for you. I swear it.” 

“Ruby—” 

“Nope.” The shaking finger became a palm in Emma’s face, which she irritatedly pushed aside. “I know you don’t approve of my tactics,” Ruby continued, “but the gauntlet’s been thrown down. My honour is at stake.” 

“Your honour? Seriously?” 

“Yes, seriously! I’m going to find you a guy or die trying, and that’s just how things are. Now, here’s your coffee.” She thrust a takeaway cup into Emma’s hand and Emma sighed heavily, watching Ruby through narrowed eyes as she handed another cup to another customer, before finally taking a long sip. 

It was a minute before her brain registered the taste of what was in her mouth and then she spit the coffee out with a choking gasp. 

“What the fuck is this?” 

“Coffee,” said Ruby, who was standing ready with a pile of paper napkins. She fluttered her lashes innocently. “Why, is there something wrong with it?”

Just then Emma heard the sound of vigorous coughing and a very familiar voice spoke up from behind her. 

“Excuse me, lass, but I think you may have given me the wrong drink,” it said.

“Oh did I?” cried Ruby. “I am so sorry! What seems to be the problem with it?” 

“Well, it’s, er, very sweet.” 

Emma sighed and turned around to face Killian. His face brightened in surprise and pleasure but she spoke before he could greet her. “I think you must have mine,” she said. “You take it black?” 

“Aye.” 

“Here.” She held out the cup she was holding. “This one’s yours.” 

“Ah. And I suppose that makes this yours.” 

They exchanged cups and smiles, Killian’s bright but confused and Emma’s resigned, especially when their fingers brushed and her heart began to race. 

“Wow,” said Ruby loudly, “what a funny mix-up. You two should definitely get each other’s names, in case it happens again.” 

Killian opened his mouth to reply but Emma gave a tiny shake of her head and he closed it again, his forehead wrinkling with a baffled frown. Emma turned to Ruby. 

“All right,” she hissed. “You win. 

“I—what?” 

“I like this one. I’ll take him. Congratulations, you did it.” 

Ruby looked genuinely nonplussed. “Are you serious?” 

“Yep.” 

“What’s the catch?” 

“No catch.” 

“Well I am a bit of a catch,” piped up Killian, who was watching the exchange with amusement and dawning understanding.

Ruby’s eyes flitted between them, narrowed in suspicion. “Emma Swan,” she growled, “if you’re fucking with me…” 

“I’m not! Honestly. Here, look, I’ll prove it.” 

She set her cup down on the counter and turned back to Killian, watching his eyes go wide and the smirk fall from his face as she grabbed him by the lapels of his jacket and pulled him in for a kiss. Dimly she heard the sound of Ruby’s gasp and of Killian’s coffee cup hitting the floor, but then his arms were around her and he was sighing against her lips and all Emma could think was that what she’d told Ruby just now was true. She did like this one, and she damned well would take him. For the first time in far too long Emma truly and honestly envisioned what her life could be with a man in it, a partner to share it with, and found that the prospect didn’t scare her. She was excited for it. She wanted it. She wanted Killian. 

For all its heat and passion he kiss ended softly, and she smiled up at Killian, still clinging to his jacket, pressing her forehead to his. He grinned back, delighted if slightly dazed. “That was rather forward of you, lass, considering we only just met,” he said, deadpan. “But I can’t say as I object.” 

“Mmmm,” she hummed. “What do you say we take our coffee somewhere quiet and get to know each other a bit better?” 

“I’d say that’s an excellent plan. But as to the coffee, well—” He indicated the steaming puddle at their feet.

“Here you go,” said Ruby, and they both turned to see her holding out a fresh cup. “On the house.” 

Killian shook his head. “Oh, I couldn’t—”

“Look, anyone who gets a kiss like that off Emma is going to need it,” said Ruby firmly. She raised an eyebrow at each of them in turn. “There’s something going on here that I don’t know about, and rest assured I will find out what it is,” she informed them. “But for now take your coffee and go. You two are distractingly hot together and I have other customers.” 

“Well if you’re—” 

“I said go!” Ruby glared until Killian took the cup from her. “Enjoy. Oh, and Emma—” 

“Yeah?” 

“Call me later.” Ruby tapped a sharp-looking fingernail meaningfully on the countertop. “Or else.” 

—

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